Various artists - Victrola Favorites: Artifacts from Bygone Days (Dust-to-Digital)

So these two musicians (ROB MILLIS and JEFFERY TAYLOR of CLIMAX GOLDEN TWINS) are obsessive collectors of 78 RPM records. Not the kind of collectors who specialize in a genre and have checklists and go around looking for specific discs, either – these guys will seemingly buy anything they see (at yard sales, thrift shops, etc.) that looks even remotely cool or intriguing, even if they’ve never heard of the artists or can’t even tell, from the foreign inscriptions, what’s on the records. Nor are Millis and Taylor only into the music – they love the labels, and any related visual ephemera.

This set of two CDs and a full-color, 144-page clothbound book is the latest result of their obsession. These recordings from the 1920s through the 1950s come, quite literally, from around the world: 17 countries, representing every continent. From Asia alone, we get Japanese folk songs, Burmese guitars, Cantonese opera, the irresistible “Big Idiot Buys a Pig” from Hong Kong, shenai and tabla (separately) from India, daegeum from Korea, Buddhist nuns, Thai ballads, and more. Africa and the Middle East are also well represented (Europe less so aside from Portugal’s fado tradition).

But there are more performers from the U.S.A. than from any other country: BLIND BOY FULLER, NOBLE SISSLE, DON REDMAN, TENNESSEE RAMBLERS, JESSIE MAY HILL, ROY SMECK, and more obscure sorts. Although their styles are more familiar to us (jazz, blues, jugband, hillbilly, gospel, etc.), in this context, some of the non-pop material can seem as exotic and ancient in origin as the world music tracks they’re juxtaposed with, and none of the selections are already over-anthologized, so they still sound fresh.

Collectors only interested in the music may well find the book irrelevant; it contains no information about the selected performers (not that there’s likely to be any info for some of these artists), nor are the visuals connected to the music. But the music itself is worth the cost.