Customer Reviews

Screamin' and Hollerin' the Blues: The Worlds of Charley Patton

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This is the musical equivalent of a family Bible. You will pass it down from children to grandchildren. It cannot be likened to any other boxed set I have ever seen - not even the lavish and fantastic Bear Family country and rockabilly sets from Germany. The Folkways reissue of the Anthology of American Folk Music comes close in look and feel, but it's still 100 miles behind.

There are three points that I would make to a potential purchaser that may not be totally obvious:

1. These recordings sound really, really good for those on the old Paramount label - where the recordings were done poorly, no metal parts exist, and all extant CDs are dubbed from 78 RPM shellac pressings, some of which are in pretty bad shape (at one point the only existing copy of Willie Brown's "Future Blues" was broken in half!). I have not heard JSP's Patton boxed set, which would seem to be a great substitute at $25 for somebody who does not want to pay $150. However, I do have JSP's "Legends of the Country Blues," which has the 1930 Son House Paramount recordings that are on disc 4 of this set. This sounds much better. The JSP sounds more No-Noised to me, while this sounds more alive on the high end. I say that as someone who has bought a lot of the JSP sets, and who would have no hesitation recommending their work generally.

2. This is not 7 CDs of just Charley Patton. This is a really good introduction to pre-Robert Johnson Delta blues. You get all the Paramount recordings of Son House, Willie Brown and Louise Johnson, two of whom were seminal figures, and the last of whom was just fun. (Somebody ought to make a movie about the roadtrip Patton, House, Brown and Johnson took to Wisconsin to record these tracks. They could get Charles Dutton to play the guy from the Delta Big Four who drove them.) You get a CD of some pretty essential stuff by various artists, including Tommy Johnson. You get the Delta Big Four, Son Sims and some others. You get a CD of interviews.

3. It's bittersweet to say, but this set may get overtaken by future discoveries. It's criminally ironic that a full-body, first-generation photo of Charley Patton finally surfaced a year after this box came out. Also, it's known that there are other Patton recordings for which 78s have yet to be found; they may turn up if they haven't already.

You KNOW you want to buy it. Don't you?

"Screamin' and Hollerin' the Blues: The Worlds of Charley Patton" is without a doubt the most impressive box set I have ever seen. The astronomical cost is justifiable once you see the craftsmanhip, love and pride that has been put into this overwhelming set.
The attention to detail is so phenomenal that this will be the box set by which all others are judged (and believe me, they will come up short). Presented in reproduction of the original 78 rpms (the exterior covers, album sleeves and cardboard reproduction of the vinyl on which the CDs are mounted) helps to bring back the feel of a time long gone.
There are biographies, advertising poster reproductions, album label reproductions and the sound quality is perhaps the best I've heard for this sort of transfer. This set even has the music and reminiscences of Patton's contemporaries.
If I could find one thing wrong with it that would be that I am now disappointed with all my other "Complete Works of..." and other box sets. All other recording labels should look at this and hang their heads in shame.

I rarely rate anything 100%, since it implies perfection and leaves nothing for subsequent efforts to improve upon. In this case, it's completely warranted. I was given this collection as a gift, so the seemingly excessive price isn't really a factor in my review, but I'm pretty sure it's worth it.
The packaging is insanely lavish and detailed. My childhood home was littered with 78 rpm records that my mother brought from her job at a music shop. When I first took this collection out of its slipcase, I was instantly transported back to that time: all that's missing is the wonderful smell of well-aged paper!

As others have mentioned here, the fidelity is spot on. That's not to say they're noise free, far from it. In fact, the Patton material on the Yazoo collections is technically cleaner sounding in some cases, but by comparison lacks the detail and immediacy you get here. I've always maintained that part of the fun of listening to restorations from this era is the mental time trip you take, and the scratchy sound helps IMO. If it had been cleaned up any more, it wouldn't sound authentic, and might very well be missing musical information as well. Here, you get the real deal, and it doesn't take long before you don't even notice the noise.

But all this would be for nothing if the music wasn't so great and deserving this treatment. Besides the Patton material, there's stuff from Son House that makes my jaw drop, 8 gospel tracks by the Delta Big Four that make me want to find religion, and lots more.

Finally, to anyone who had anything to do with this release's production: if you don't win a Grammy, TANFJ (there ain't no justice). You deserve it!

Revenant has outdone itself with this very classy (and very expensive) boxed set. It must be seen to be believed ( it'sconstructed like one of those old dusty albums with built-in sleeves for storing 78s that you may have seen in your grandparents' attic), and just crammed with text and music and tidbits. Revenent has done very handsome and original packaging for its past CDs (see the Dock Boggs and the American Primitive compilations, for example), but it just doesn't prepare you for the visual and tactile conucopia that awaits you with this packaging.

The set comes with a copy of John Fahey's long out of print thesis on Patton, critical essays on Patton, his music, and his milieu, a collection of the latst lyric transriptions (some of the fun when listening to Patton is wondering what the hell he is saying...and sometimes the lyrics don't help!), and collection of label-stickers from every Patton 78 release. The seven CDs are attached to round black cardboard which slip into the sleeves...turning the whole set into one giant leap back into the thirties!

And it's not just the packaging.

These cuts, virtually all of which are available on compilations issued by Yazoo and Catfish, have been exquisitly re-mastered. This collection makes those previous compilations obsolete when it comes to sound. Patton's powerful singing is in your face regardless of the quality of the recording (and most of his recordings were issued on Paramount, which were bad sounding even when they were issued in the late twenties), but here his singing and playing is in full glory.

As if all this weren't enough, "Screamin' and Hollerin' the Blues" also includes performances by Son House and Willie Brown, for example, which were originally recorded during Patton's early recording sessions. This as well as perfomers who presumably influenced Patton and cuts from performers who were in turn directly influenced by Patton himself.

If you love Charley Patton's art, and you have the money to blow, get this set.

Having purchased Patton's previously released material on Yazoo Records, I was astounded at the difference in the quality of the sound on this 7 disc set. The re-mastering is phenomenal. The artwork, liner notes, and period-piece design make this set a must for blues fans & collectors. Having been waiting for this set for over a year, my high expectations were in every way exceeded. For those of you who love Delta Blues, this collection is essential. If you think "The Blues" begins and ends with Robert Johnson, cash your paycheck & purchase this set. Patton was a brilliant entertainer & Johnson, Skip James, Fred McDowell et al owe much to his pioneering efforts. A MUST.

I agree with everything everyone else said. This set is 100% superb! I got it for Christmas and am nowhere near through absorbing all the material.

I remember when I got the 2CD Robert Johnson set when it first came out (my first EVER blues purchase, or even listening for me!) and I was amazed by the material. Well consider that this is essentially 3-4x that! And the sound had to be restored and really, re-invigorated more. Heaven!!!

It's amazing how far we've come... We went from 2CDs of Robert Johnson to the 3CD Muddy Waters Chess Box set, and now this...

Anyway I couldn't possibly say enough good things about this set, but there is 1 very important point I'd like to make.

The listing of tracks is not quite accurate. There are some negative tracks, eg -1, -2 which you have to rewind on your CD player to get to. Disks 2 and 3 if I remember correctly. Anyway this is fine unless like me you have a CD player that can't play these tracks (alternate takes so you're missing takes not material). When I discovered this I e-mailed Revenant and they very kindly, and free of charge, burned the 4 tracks in question onto a CD and sent it me. So that's a little info for you out there. So if you have the set and can't play the negative tracks or are considering buying this is just something to be aware of.

The only other CD I've come across with a similar situation is the 00 track on Maxwell's Embrya album. I've still NEVER heard it! Of course I don't care as much in that case.

But it is a tribute to the fine folks at Revenant Records that they stand behind their set so well! This is beyond first class.

The price is prohibitive it's true, but this is absolutely everything a box set of this caliber should be. It is a true collector's piece that will offer you years of education and insight into a founder of the modern blues form and the blues in general. This is one of the places that so much later music sprnag from that it's impossible and pointless to list.

I'm sure the 3CD Catfish set is fine and gives you the essential Patton sides, but this provides so much in context, and analysis. ... If you like the blues you will NOT regret this, and if you LOVE the blues, bet you're figuring out to afford it and get it into your hands.

Here's hoping it's the start of many lovingly produced sets by Revenant and others to help preserve the tradition of the blues.

I love this set, but for the price, I think it's more for those who, like me, fell off into the deep end. For the money, I would recommend the JSP set, it's $25 and has all of Patton's recordings.
The JSP definetly has more noise reduction, which can be a plus to newbies,(but I prefer the more original sound of the recordings, no matter what. They are history after all.) That said, you get a copy of Fahey's long out of print book,( Which goes for more then $200) plus an amazing packaging by Revenant. There is much material hear to study.

Charley Patton was the most important bluesman of his day. He was a guitar hero. He was a model of excellence. He chronicled his era in song. Today, unfortunately, he is all but forgotten outside of the cult of historic blues lovers.
I am so happy that a tribute of this scope and enormity has been paid to Charley Patton. This box set is a work of art. The set resembles a folio of 78 r.p.m. records, and includes 2 books,one of which was authored by the late, great John Fahey(this set was his dream),regularly sells on Ebay for in excess of $100, 7 CDs which are attached to cardboard 78s in folio sleeves, reproduction stickers of the labels of all of Charley Patton's records,the cloth portions of the cover are embossed ,it's absolutely beautiful. All commentary is by noted blues scholars, Dick Spottswood, David Evans, and the afforementioned angel, John Fahey. There may be more, I'm still pouring over this amazing accomplishment and relishing all it's intricacies, it's a shame John Fahey did not live to see it's completion, but I'm sure he's looking down smiling, and proud. Revenant has always been a great label, and this is it's crowning achievement. When I die I want this set right in the coffin with me!

The music of Charley Patton has been issued before, but never like this. The packaging is absolutely amazing. We're talking Grammy potential. The amount of information included will provide you with several hours of reading. It's also presented in a very attractive way.

The discs themselves sound great, better than any other issues of this material. Each disc comes attached to a black disc that makes it the size of a 78. Each disc is then housed in a replica 78 sleeve, like the old 78 binders (which this package is a replica of).

If you're a fan of pre-war blues and look at box sets (Bear Family especially) as works of art, then this set is a must-have.

I remember, oh how I remember 1966. Mike Raven 's blues show, Radio 390, was streaming down the Thames Estuary from an old WWII fort off of Whitstable (while the great man himself hid in a grand Victorian block flat in Chelsea).
We'd all been travelling back both in time and to the delta, starting to ask Lord Stanshall's searching but yet unvoiced question ourselves: could blue men, indeed, sing the whites?, and particularly encountering a lot of wise and sometime wicked men whose first name was Blind, and also a strange, pursued creature called Robert Johnson, who could do things to a guitar that suggested he'd been talking to Pagannini at the very least. But these were men, we're talking about: John Huston style, wide-screen heroic, as in mythologies.

So one Sunday evening, June/July, Mike (Churton Fairman to his mum)and so sadly gone, tells us he's got hold of an Arhoolie album with Charlie Patton on it and we've got to listen to THIS (and this about a week after he'd shocked the nation by playing the Muddy Waters acoustic recordings down in Clarksdale which themselves shook us more than somewhat, to conflate Lord Buckley and Damon Runyon both).

Oh dear, had we ever heard anything so primitive?

Sheeeeit, we'd heard Butterbeans and Susie (earlier), we'd heard Lonnie and Ed Young (later, but sounding like they just were dragged off the boat with their pure Dahomey rhythms, shave and a hircut, 2 bits), and we'd heard and learned to genuflect at the mention of aforesaid Johnson. So did any of it prepare us for growling, thumping Charley Patton?

Hell, no, Kincaid. Never heard nothing so RAW before.

But did it count for anything, did it stack up as prissy white man's (boy's) comprehension of art?

Not quite at the time. We heard it as primitive, we even heard it as a precursor; we didn't quite hear it as what it was. Because we were snotty, and 15, with an established pantheon in place, any of whose first names were Blind, otherwise Robert. Frankly, it sounded rough. And very scratchy.

Well, more time has passed since then, than between the recording and that re-discovery. Thank the good god, whatever its name, that John Fahey had greater faith, and better ears, and more genuine spunk than the rest of us, because he engineered this, possibly the most lavish CD box yet, whatever the genre. This is homage writ large. Oh, bend your knee indeed when you play these discs. Ain't nothin' like nothin', but the real thing always gets you that way, unless you're talking soda.

Dig deep and buy.

The most important re-issue of the CD era (and that includes Rhino Handmade's Fugs box).