First Voices on Joe’s Dobbs’ Radio Show

#365 / Flood Time Capsule: 1984

Joe Dobbs’ beloved “Music from the Mountains” radio show was not yet a year old when he started getting tired of only spinning records on the air.

As noted in an earlier report here, Joe’s original pitch to West Virginia Public Broadcasting was to create a live music show, a weekly showcase of not only famed but also little-known musicians from The Mountain State. Management initially was wary, but warmed to the idea as they got to know Joe.

Call the Guests

So, months after the November 1983 launch of the show, Dobbs began bringing in old friends like Mack Samples and Buddy Griffin as guest artists to be interviewed and then to sing and play a few songs. And then a few more. And then even more.

After a while, “live from Studio B” became one of Joe’s favorite on-air tropes. Everybody knew there really was no separate studio.

“Studio B” meant Joe was fixing to swivel around from his board of switches and knobs, face the pickers assembled at the nearby microphones and say, “So, whatcha got next, guys?”

Among the early guests Joe invited during that first year were his old Flood brothers Roger Samples and Charlie Bowen.

Reports of Our Death….

As noted earlier, by the 1980s, the Family Flood had begun to speak of their band in past tense. And, in fact, it did appear as if The Flood — after a decade of rowdiness at parties, jam sessions and coffeehouses — might just have to be put away with the other sweet things of youth.

That was certainly the mood when Roger and Charlie joined Joe on the radio 40 years ago this week for a couple of hours of talk and tunes. Click the button below for a 20-minute sample of that June 30, 1984, show:

As you hear in the clip, Joe’s interview touched on some of the early milestones of Floodery, including Charlie talking about hearing Roger at the the Marshall University coffeehouse before their band came together.

And you’ll hear Roger chuckle when Charlie calls the boss’s upcoming swimming party “a biggie on our schedule.” (That gig did come off, incidentally, and Pamela Bowen got the picture to prove it.)

Flood Redux

Of course, for the all the use of past tense verbs in the interview, The Flood would rise again after the drought of the Eighties. The band had many return visits to “Music from the Mountains” over the years.

In fact, just a decade or so later, when the band got its big second wind, Joe brought Dave Peyton and Charlie back to the show for an evening of chatting and picking.

Here’s an 8-minute hunk of the “Music from the Mountains” episode during which Joe gets Dave talking about his lifelong love the Autoharp, followed by a live performance of Peyton’s signature tune, “Furniture Man”:

From the same August 1997 broadcast, here’s an especially pretty tune, Joe's performance of an Irish melody he learned from Tony Ellis:

On down the road, The Flood would even go on to write the “Music from rhe Mountains” theme song, but that’s a story we’ve already told here. If you missed it, here’s the link.