When Doug Returned to His Roots
#558 / Flood Time Capsule: 2016
The Flood’s basic instrumentation took a major new turn 10 years ago this week when Doug Chaffin brought his sweet new solid-body electric guitar to its first jam session at the Bowen House.
Doug had just gotten the guitar from Glen Perkins, a friend and fellow picker who in those day regularly drove the 90 miles east to Ashland from his Owingsville, Ky., home for an evening of picking with Doug.
Glen has long had a passion for prowling pawn shops and flea markets in the hunt for hidden musical treasures. When he found that beautiful little red sunburst Paul Reed Smith guitar, he immediately thought of his buddy Doug.
For Doug Chaffin, it was love at first sight (and hearing). And for the rest of us, it was pure joy to listen to how that guitar awakened Doug’s rock ’n’ roll roots.
You can hear it too! Just three weeks after that introduction to the new guitar, the band recorded its “Live, In Concert” album and Doug’s new baby is evident from the first notes of the first track. Click the button below to hear it:
About Those Rock Roots
Doug Chaffin made music around the Tri-State Area for more than 60 years, beginning in great young rock ‘n’ roll bands of the 1950s.
Growing up in the Ashland, he was in high school when he joined a rockabilly and rock group called The Montereys, named after the Mercury Monterey automobile.
Playing lead guitar alongside school friends like Don Prater, Doug performed a variety of rhythm and blues and early rock standards. Doug reminisced about those days during a 2002 visit to Joe Dobbs’ “Music from the Mountains” radio show on West Virginia Public Radio, a snippet of which you can hear by pressing the button below:
A legendary artifact from Doug’s youth was the 1958 Gibson Les Paul that his father bought for him brand new when Doug was 16.
Remarkably, Doug still had that guitar 50 years later, even preserving the original sales receipt. He brought it out only for special occasions, like a December 2016 evening that we commemorated in that week’s edition of the weekly podcast, which you can hear below:
More from Mister Chaffin
It is always such a joy to reminisce about our friend Doug, who played with The Flood for nearly a quarter of a century on a wide range of instruments, from bass and mandolin to guitar and fiddle.
If you’re not quite ready to leave Mister Chaffin’s side just yet, linger with us on the Doug Channel on our free Radio Floodango music streaming service for a randomized playlist of Doug tunes!
