i was extremely excited when i got an email from norwegian folk musician and music archivist c. strom (check out some of his tunes here) detailing his latest project, 'the sound of shellac'. the recordings you hear here are from his private collection of 78s, and they aren't digitized or 'ripped' as these things usually are. these are tape recordings of strom playing the discs on his 1950's era philips radio cabinet.
this subtle distinction is really something, as in some ways this process re-creates these old songs as entirely new objects, similar to the experiments attempted on john fahey's knotty psychedelic masterpiece, 'voice of the turtle'. strom's work, however, does not include the obfuscation and mystification that fahey employed when using old recordings within his own. while c. strom recreates for us the experience of listening to these artifacts of shellac in the form of new objects, WAVS (mp3s is what you'll receive if you download it), he is completely open about the process, and the result is delightful. i recommend this very highly.
name your price for it here.