Old Time Victrola Music

18 songs, copyright 1997 Mark Best

Distributed by www.earlyrecordings.com

$16.95 (3.95 S/H)

Contents:

1. I'd Feel at Home If They'd Let Me Join the Army performed by Billy Murray
2. JA-DA performed by Arthur Fields
3. K-K-K-Katy performed by Billy Murray
4. The Old Grey Mare performed by Collins and Harlan
5. The Worst Is Yet to Come performed by Peerless Quartet
6. Where Do We Go From Here performed by American Quartet
7. Life In A Trench in Belgium (1) performed by Lt. Gitz Rice and Henry Burr
8. Life In A Trench in Belgium (2) performed by Lt. Gitz Rice and Henry Burr
9. The Rose of No Mans Land performed by Charles Hart/Elliott Shaw
10. There's Another Angel Now in old Kilarney performed by Sam Ash
11. Good Morning Mr. Zip Zip Zip performed by Arthur Fields
12. Hike! Hike! Hike! performed by Peerless Quartette
13. Just Like Washington Crossed the Delaware performed by Peerless Quartette
14. Keep Your Head Down Fritzie Boy performed by American Quartet
15. Tramp, Tramp, Tramp performed by John Young
16. We Stopped Them At The Marne performed by Arthur Fields/Peerless Quartette
17. What'll We Do With Him Boys performed by William J. Reilly
18. You Keep Sending 'em Over and We'll Keep Knocking em Down performed by Arthur Fields

Every Dawn Patrol player has his music. For some of us, its the soundtrack to "The Blue Max." I've always favored an old cassette entitled "Great Songs of the Great War." Other players prefer vintage engine sounds on CD, other movie soundtracks or Snoopy's Red Baron Christmas from the 1960's. But whatever the means, the mood must be set for a proper game of Dawn Patrol. So when Mark Best of www.earlyrecordings.com sent me their CD release of World War I songs, I was immediately intrigued and knew that a lot of Dawn Patrol players and World War I aviation fans would be delighted to hear about it.

My first concern was quality. In a world spoiled by multi-million dollar marketing efforts, I wondered if a small company with a niche product could put out a quality compact disc that wouldn't disappoint. I opened the package to find an attractive CD in a full sized case that had been properly shipped and arrived in excellent condition. So far, so good. I was delighted to find that the CD's cover was tastefully done and perfectly designed for a vintage product. The cover was printed on heavy stock paper of a fleck marble color, giving it the appearance of age. The fonts were well chosen to reflect the time period, and a contemporary drawing of American soldiers in a trench completed the presentation. But what the case contained turned out to be even more attractive.

The compact disc itself was more what you'd expect from a major recording studio, not a small, private company in Chesterfield, Virginia. The CD was clearly top quality. I know that appearance doesn't really matter since its the music that interests us, but I'm picky. I want my CD's to look good... and this one did. The CD itself is not the usual prismatic silver, but actually a brilliant gold color. The labeling on the top is a perfectly matched gold marble fleck accented by vintage fonts and prismatic gold trim around the edges. The case spine is labeled and easily read for bookshelf-type storage and all songs are listed sequentially on the reverse. All in all, the packaging is very nice and sets an excellent standard for any company large or small.

But the music, of course, is the real treat. The buyer is offered 18 selections of popular music from World War I; nearly double what you get from a modern artist on most CD's. We are all familiar with a few Great War songs such as "It's a Long, Long Way to Tipperary," "Some Girl Has Got To Darn His Socks" and "Over There." But Old Time Victrola Music has gone beyond the obvious and gathered a stunning array of music that doesn't simply reflect our modern memories of the war, but reflects the war era itself. There is a massive difference between what was popular in World War I and what the world now remembers as being popular in World War I. This selection cuts straight to the heart of history and presents the very songs that soldiers enjoyed in Parisian cafés while on leave, or with their girlfriends back home.

Perhaps the best thing about Old Time Victrola Music is the method by which the recordings are made. I have a working 1923 Brunswick Panatrope graphaphone in my World War I collection, and I still use it on rare occasions. The sound that it creates is unlike any other. The pop and hiss of the old records is accentuated by the crude amplifiers to such a degree that the background noise is actually part of the sound. Without it, the music simply doesn't sound right.

With that in mind, Old Time Victrola Music has recorded each and every song live off of a 1918 phonograph with very little noise reduction or post-production cleanup. The result is a compact disc that makes your home stereo sound exactly - and I mean exactly - like the phonographs found in the mess halls of every squadron across France in World War I. You can hear the needle hissing across the groove at the beginning of each song. You can hear the familiar pop of an old record and the shrill high notes that combine for an unquantifiable sound that can only be reproduced by either a genuine phonograph or a time machine back to World War I. If you have the slightest appreciation of history or the even the most vague romantic notion of the Great War, your mind will quickly wander back to smoke filled ante-rooms where teenage pilots danced with Red Cross girls late into the night, knowing with every step that they could die at dawn. The songs - and more importantly the sounds - will stimulate your imagination and take you back to a time when the phonograph was cutting edge technology, when everyone was fighting but no one knew why, and when life and love accelerated at a pace that only a veteran of war can understand.

This CD delivers the nostalgia, the music, and most importantly the fullness of sound that customers pay for. It is money well spent and I can highly recommend it with full confidence.

I can find nothing significant to criticize in this CD. If there were flaws, I would point them out without hesitation but I simply can't find any. The music is well chosen, the sound replication is stunning, and the price is competitive with anything you can buy at Walmart. We are fortunate that someone out there is producing this music, especially in a format that retains the depth and character of the original sound. The same company produces an entire line of WWI CD's which can be seen and sampled on their web site.

This CD is one of the best choices you can make to set the mood for Dawn Patrol gaming. So light the oil lamp, crank up the Victrola and roll the dice. You'll be closer to France than you ever thought possible.

Indysquadron.com rating: 5 stars out of 5