Baby, How Can It Be? Songs of Love, Lust and Contempt from the 1920s and 1930s
Description: Three CDs, 12 page booklet, Digipack case
Publication Date: November 23, 2010
Availability: In Stock orMP3 Download with PDF booklet
Compiled by John Heneghan, these three CDs are derived from John’s 78 rpm record collection with liner notes by Nick Tosches and a centerfold illustration by R. Crumb.
“As is commonly recognized, or so at least it should be stated for matters at hand, the 1920s and 1930s represented the golden age of the love song. Baby, How Can It Be? Songs of Love, Lust and Contempt—don’t forget that odi-et-amo angle—from the 1920s and ’30s reflects that age of gold resplendently. Chosen from the collection of John Heneghan, the sixty-six recordings here are alive with more cooing, kissing, cupidity, cussing, and killing than lifetimes of longing, heavenly and demonic, could ever aspire to. Talk about a handful of young roe and its discontents. As them Hebe smut-hounds of old used to say, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet.” — Nick Tosches, from the liner notes
Aquarius Records: “There are horns, banjos, yodeling, scatting, fiddles, barrelhouse piano, ukuleles, all manner of voices, rough and raw, sweet croons, male, female, and the lyrics… from honest and heartfelt, to saucy and bawdy, to downright nasty, another winner from Dust-to-Digital, definitely one of our new favorite old timey reissues, and as with all D2D releases, gorgeous packaging, a full color 8 panel digipak, with tons of photos and paintings, and really funny liner notes by Nick Tosches.”
No Depression: “The three disc collection is culled from the record collection of John Heneghan and features everything from Appalachian folk and Dixieland jazz to Hawaiian ballads and cowboy songs. Virtually every form of roots music can be found here, from artists as well known as Uncle Dave Macon and Cab Calloway, to those such as Henry Thomas who should be familiar to devotees of the eras music, to complete unknowns like Hazel Scherf and Davey Miller… In short, the set provides hours of great, rarely heard music from the Golden Age of Recording and would be the perfect gift for the roots music fan in your life.”