We are inching ever closer to the official release date for our Rise & Fall of Paramount Volume 2, and already much has been made of the beautiful design elements of the package in far ranging brilliant and respected publications such as Wired and The Atlantic. Yes the delights contained within this machine-age inspired aluminum wonder box are sumptuous and many, though we most certainly should point out that the original manufacturers of these now historical recordings were far more cavalier (dare we say careless) with the production process of their wares. Paramount records were notoriously comprised of the cheapest materials available, right down to dredging materials from the Milwaukee river. And while in retrospect it’s a lovely and romantic notion that this music that has come to very much represent our very fabric of American life and folk tradition was LITERALLY manufactured from dredged mud and American soil, it certainly didn’t make for the most perishably resistant form of musical entertainment. But alas, this all may speak to what is so endearing about this ghostly music that calls to us down distant hallways of history. It will always be unknowable to some degree, it will never exist in perfect fidelity… it really never did. But I digress…
ON that note… Hey! Here’s a beautiful paper stop-motion animated film by Kelli Anderson imagining what happened the day the grand daddy of all American Blues ghosts Charley Patton walked into the studio and set to recording “High Water Everywhere, Part 1”.
If you enjoyed that film nearly as much as we do, you’ll want to know a little more about how it was made. Well you’re in luck, here’s a wonderful post about it over on the animators own site giving lots of insight into the process and philosophy behind the animation. Enjoy!
Another feature of Rise & Fall that is getting some love in the press are the “Defender Ad” reproductions that are featured in the hardbound book and flash drive contained in the set. Get a primer on this distinct piece of advertisements-as-high art from the Dangerous Minds blog and then pick one up for yourself… We’ll be selling two of these screen prints (which were printed in very limited quantities) to Vault members only in the Vault Store. The other 3 beautiful reproductions are available to everyone in our online store. All were screened at Kangaroo press here in Nashville.
