One for the Books
#471 / Flood Time Capsule: 2004
For a decade or so, The Flood was regularly invited to entertain visiting authors, publishers and readers who attended Huntington’s biennial Ohio River Festival of Books, hosted by the Cabell County Public Library.
The band’s first booking for this bookish bunch was at a reception for ORFOB participants 21 years ago this week at the Huntington Civic Center.
"We had a super time," Charlie told his mom in an email this next morning. "We all arrived about 6:30 and got set up in the corner of the dining room where all the visiting authors would be assembling for a little food and conversation.”
The band intentionally went without a sound system or a stage. “We told the organizer that we knew our place,” Charlie added with a chuckle. “We were to be background music for the groups visiting and talking.”
It turned out to be a good call. The acoustics in the room were surprisingly good, so the guys didn't need amplification.
“We kicked in to our first tune promptly at 7 and the crowd seemed to love it,” Bowen wrote. “We just jammed; everyone was in a very good mood and the music reflected that.”
The band did a 45-minute set, then took a break for refreshments and a little glad-handing. “Then we did a second set and wrapped it up. The organizers were very pleased with the way it went."
Future Festivals
So pleased were the library folks, in fact, that The Flood was invited back for more performances over the next 10 years of ORFOBs, and guys showed up in various configurations, ranging from the minimalist Flood Lite trio in 2006….
… to The Flood’s assorted faux orchestra setups in later years.
Putting it in Perspective
If you want to see where all this fits into the bigger picture of The Flood’s story, visit the newsletter’s archive and check out the Flood History section, which preserves reports of the group’s major events over the past half century.
