This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Recently Charlie brought a different version to this great old English ballad for the guys to try out after revisiting his all-time favorite rendition of it, Tom Rush’s recording of the tune on the old Prestige/Folklore label back in 1963. 

Like Rush, Charlie cultivates a slightly different melody line. He also brings in his resonator guitar and slide to give the tune a slightly bluesy quality. Then Danny Cox and Sam St. Clair add beautiful solos and Randy Hamilton provides the perfect subtle vocal harmonies along with his bass lines. Here's the result.

 

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Ours is a band that was born at a party and born TO party. Whether we’re at home in our band room at the Bowen House, settled in the living room of somebody else’s house or on stage at a gig, the party tradition that started more than a half century ago continues today. 

 
And our next opportunity for a public party will be this very weekend when we launch the Spring Floodango this Sunday afternoon at Huntington’s Alchemy Theater. Here’s a tune we have on tap for the afternoon. Take a listen and you’ll be ready for the sing-alongs when you join us at Alchemy Theater!

Remember, we’re at Alchemy Theater, 68 Holley Ave, in the beautiful hills of Huntington this Sunday afternoon. The fun starts at 2:30 p.m. Tickets are $20 and all the proceeds go to support the good work of Alchemy Theater. For more information visit the web site at Floodat50.com.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Our friend David Click told us recently how much he enjoys the band’s performance of this tune. He said that while it’s a sad song, he’s found a solace in the lyrics, that it touches him especially in times of loss and grief. 

We understand; it moves us that way too. For instance, this particular performance comes from back in November at the first rehearsal after we learned of the death of our band mate Doug Chaffin. 

 
Doug loved this song, and you might be able to hear this this track how we felt somehow a little closer to him, to be singing this song in his memory on that cold autumn night.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Some songs just never get old. Here’s a rowdy tune that had already been around for while when Grandpa was a pup and today, well, it’s still pretty sassy, with a cut in its strut and a glide in its stride. 

It’s the kind of song we like the start the evening with, as we did here at last week’s rehearsal, because it has room for everyone to just stretch out and wail. 

 
Listen as the solos pass from Danny to Sam to Randy. And when it’s Jack’s turn, he reaches for those wooden spoons he keeps near his drum kit. See if it doesn’t sound like a jazzy tap dancer has just jumped into the room. 

So here we go. Set your time machine back to 1913. Here’s Shelton Brooks’s “I Wonder Where My Easy Rider’s Gone.”

 

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 To give this classic from the 1970s a new sound, the guys let my banjo happily trot alongside Jack’s drum and Randy’s bass, ready to frame our vocals and those sweet solos by Danny and Sam. 

And, hey, be sure to keep listening to reach our surprise ending. We wrap up with a bit of old-time music, a little sumpin-sumpin circa 1680.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 This rowdy old tune has been rattling around in our brain for a quarter quarter or so — ever since the late Joe Dobbs gave us tapes of some little-known blues records from the 1920s and ’30s — but only recently did it finally pop up in the The Flood’s repertoire.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Some songs in our repertoire we do only when “The Chick Singer” — Floodster emerita Michelle Hoge — is in the room. 

Our take on this good old Ivory Joe Hunter classic is at the top of that list. This track is from last December when Michelle had driven in from her Cincinnati area home to rehearse with us in preparation for our big “Flood at 50” New Year’s Eve birthday bash at Alchemy Theatre. 

Just listen to Michelle rocking those vocal harmonies, as always.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 You never really forget the songs of your youth. Charlie was 10 years old in the summer of ‘59 when this tune hit the radio. 

 
It was such a hoot to take it for a spin at a recent Flood rehearsal.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 We’re late to the party on this tune. Bob Dylan wrote this more than a quarter of century ago, but we just started doing it a few weeks ago. 

However, it’s suddenly landed solidly in the repertoire. Here’s our take on “Make You Feel My Love.”

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 We’ve been doing this song for a very long time, and it’s always different, depending on who’s in the room. 

 
In this rendition from a rehearsal a few weeks ago, our man Danny Cox makes it special with his signature guitar stylings.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 The Flood has been doing versions of this song for decades. 

This rendition was the first song of the evening at a Flood rehearsal a few weeks ago. Riding on the infectious rhythm laid down by Randy Hamilton and Jack Nuckols and framing the solos by Danny Cox and Sam St. Clair, the number heralded a particularly fun evening at the Bowen house.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 This song took a very long road on its journey to Floodlandia. 

The first time it was played in our band room was more than a dozen years ago on a mellow autumn night when our friends Randy Hamilton and Paul Martin dropped in to jam with us. Now, neither was a member of The Flood yet — Randy would join the following year and Paul a few years after that — but their song was the hit of the evening. 

However, the tune never worked its way into the repertoire — until just recently. A couple of weeks ago, Danny Cox just happened to start picking the tune between songs on the night’s practice list and the melody really jingled in our memories. 

After that, Dan and Randy got together to woodshed a little, working out an arrangement, and at last week’s rehearsal they popped it on the rest of us. With joy, everybody joined in. So here -- call it a keepsake for our audio scrapbook — is our first take on “Ready for the Times to Get Better.”

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

“Sweet Georgia Brown” entered The Flood’s repertoire soon after the band began in the 1970s and in the ensuing decades the tune has come back into the playlist again and again, serving as a sweet showcase for dozens of Flood soloists over the years. 

This latest rendition, recorded at a rehearsal just last week, has Danny Cox, Randy Hamilton, Sam St. Clair and Jack Nuckols all taking the tune for a spin.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 It was 15 years ago when Sam St. Clair brought us this tune, and it quickly became his theme song. 

Ever since then, “Ain’t No Free” has been a beloved standard in many a Flood show.

So, of course, the song had to have a place in honor several weeks ago at our big New Year’s Eve birthday bash at Alchemy Theatre.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

 Here’s a tune with some mighty deep roots in the Floodisphere. 

Two decades after our heroes, The Coasters, released this song in July 1957, The Flood started fiddling with it on another summer night. After that, though, it went to sleep again for, oh, a half century or so.

 
Then not long ago, it popped back into our minds. Right away, Randy Hamilton started singing harmony on the chorus. Suddenly the song is back, evolving into a fine vehicle for Jack Nuckols’ cool drumming and tasty solos by Danny Cox and everyone else in the room. 

Even visiting pickers. For instance, on this track, Floodster Emeritus Paul Martin dropped in with his mandolin. Just listen to how slowly he jumped right into the mix!

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

Whenever our old friend Paul Martin is back in the room — or, better still, on the bandstand with us, as he was for our big “Flood at 50” big birthday bash — we always get him to take us on a ride on is favorite Bob Dylan tune.

This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

  Ever since it came together decades ago, The Flood has always sought a rich diversity in its repertoire. So late last year when Danny Cox asked, “Has the band ever done the song ‘Sunny’?” he heard an invitation in the enthusiasm of the answer: “no.” 

So, Danny worked out the chords, Jack took up the rhythm, we turned the vocals over to Randy, and suddenly the song is in the works. In fact, it’s even picking up fans among the visitors. 

On this particular track, for instance, Floodster Emeritus Paul Martin happened to be in the room and happily took a ride on one of the choruses. Here’s the progress report, then, on Project Sunny.