Various Artists - The Rise And Fall Of Paramount Records: Volume 1 (1917-27)

Note from Third Man Records to prospective buyers: Each limited-edition, individually-numbered cabinet is handmade by humans. As such, no two are exactly alike, whether in the patina of their quarter-sawn oak surface or the placement of the hand-applied gold leaf labels on the records. The buyer should expect some degree of irregularity associated with the human hand at work. None of these aspects should impact the performance of the product.

The Rise and Fall of Paramount Records, Volume One (1917-1927); six colored vinyl LPs in a period-style oak cabinet

LPs feature nearly 100 classic Paramount releases

Also includes USB drive jammed with 800 tracks from Paramount's first 10 years

Plus two boutique-quality books packed with annotation and original memorabilia

Jack White's most ambitious project to date as a record label boss is The Rise and Fall of Paramount Records, Volume One (1917-1927). Here's why: The anthology comes in a period-perfect oak cabinet resembling that of a portable Victrola and includes two, large boutique-quality books packed with annotation and original memorabilia; a birch-wood folio with six colored-vinyl LPs featuring almost 100 classic Paramount releases; and, in a felt-lined pocket at the bottom of the box, a USB drive jammed with 800 tracks from Paramount's first 10 years.

Says Rolling Stone, "And that music is essential American history." Established by a Wisconsin chair manufacturer, Paramount issued thousands of 78 RPM sides by pioneers and stars of early-20th century blues, jazz and country, including Blind Blake, Ma Rainey, Jelly Roll Morton, Blind Lemon Jefferson, the virtuoso fiddler Osey Helton and a sideman, the young Louis Armstrong. "It's a remarkable pantheon of greats," Dean Blackwood told Rolling Stone. Blackwood co-founded, with the late guitarist John Fahey, the Revenant label, which is co-releasing the set with White's Third Man Records. "It was an embarassment of riches, especially for a company that really wanted to sell expensive bits of furniture."

The first volume of this contemporary telling of the Paramount story is available in a limited edition of 5,000 copies. Volume Two is scheduled to come in 2014 and will feature the Paramount label's greatest blues man, Charley Patton. White and Blackwood told Rolling Stone they have to sell as many as 4,000 sets of Volume One just to break even on the production costs.

"But everything we do, it's never to make a dollar," White said of Third Man, which has recently released vinyl compilations of Blind Willie McTell and the Mississippi Shieks and started a reissue line of seminal Sun Records 45s. "It's always to make something exist. And we end up paying the bills that way, because other people want to experience those things too."

 

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