Steve Ramm wrote: "BTW, when I read that the book has rare Paramount
artwork, I emailed John Tefteller […] to ask if it was from the stash he
found [sic]* [….] He said "no" and he doesn't know source of discs on this
set. He says he's "treating it as a bootleg". An expensive one of course."
Leaving aside the question of whether Mr. Tefteller issues bootlegs of
Paramount recordings himself (albeit expertly transferred ones), he of
course is not the only one who has an extensive collection of Paramount
Records. I don't believe he got any of the late Max Vreed's collection at
the time it was sold, although he may have acquired some of it by now.
(Does he collect jazz and old-time records? Will any be on this set?) And
I imagine this Paramount box set will re-issue some or all of the transfers
Revenant made for their "Screaming and Hollering the Blues" set. Still, I
have fears that this may turn out to be 800 mp3s of transfers stolen from
Yazoo and Herwin LPs, supplemented with the Document library of transfers of
variable quality. Anyway, I hope it gets reviewed by someone who is
familiar with all these earlier issues and can sort out what the set has the
offer. It certainly too dodgy for me to want to pre-order.
On the other hand, Black Europe will offer a vast amount of material that
either has never been reissued, or has been reissued in poor quality sound
(I'm thinking of the Document CDs of the Versatile Four and Dan Kildare,
which featured skipping grooves, or the Ethiopiques volume 27 CD of the
1908-10 recordings Azmari Tessema Eshete, which are almost certainly
microphone recordings of acoustic phonograph playback). That is a set I am
looking forward to.
Best wishes, Mark
*Mr. Tefteller actually purchased the Paramount advertising material from
three individuals who had rescued it from the dumpster. His Blues Calendar
issues are excellent, and the sound quality on the accompanying CDs are
excellent as well.
|