During sophomore year of high school, Dabek met John Russell (who later became photographer for the Traverse City Record-Eagle) and his group of friends who were all avidly interested in folk music. John had assembled a "Jug Band" and invited him to sing and play washboard, jug, and occasional guitar or mandolin. Jug Band Music is a form of music borne out of the using just about anything you could use to make music.  Jugs, washboards, washtub bass, guitars, banjos, you name it. It's sort of a cross between bluegrass and the city dump. Most of the music is lively, uptempo stuff and the players and the audience certainly had fun playing and hearing it. Pretty unique music. There are no known existing recordings of this group.