Sixty-three songs, 102 photographs: the sources behind the Deluxe CD

Liner notes in a geography game

Deluxe's CD versions give every location music and pictures, and credit both properly. The data behind the Source Information program, on the 1993 DOS CD and again on the 1995 Windows disc, holds 63 recordings for 51 locations, so some states get two (Georgia has “Atlanta Bounce” and “Going to Georgia”). Each credit reads like a liner note: track, artist, album, catalogue number, copyright holder, label address.

The labels

None of it came from Smithsonian Folkways or the Library of Congress. By catalogue number: Arhoolie (El Cerrito, California) 21, Rounder (Cambridge, Massachusetts) 17, Canyon Records (Phoenix) 8, Rebel Records (Floyd, Virginia) 5, Philo 5 (three of them copyrighted by Rounder Records Corp.), County Records (Roanoke, Virginia) 1 and Messidor (Frankfurt am Main) 1. That leaves five: one track copyrighted in 1993 by its singer, Chuna McIntyre, and four made for the game.

Who's on it

The blues names include Fred McDowell, Big Joe Williams, Earl Hooker and Piano Red. Texas gets Robert Shaw's barrelhouse piano piece “The Ma Grinder” and Flaco Jiménez's “Ay Te Dejo En San Antonio”. Bluegrass and Appalachian music bring Ralph Stanley & the Clinch Mountain Boys (three tracks), Del McCoury, the Country Gentlemen, dobro player Jerry Douglas (three) and Hazel Dickens singing “West Virginia, My Home”. Louisiana gets Clifton Chenier and the trio of Dewey Balfa, Marc Savoy and D.L. Menard; Nevada gets Jonathan Richman's “Reno”; The Klezmorim and Mario Bauzá appear too. Canyon supplied eight Native American recordings, from the Gu-Achi Fiddlers' Tohono O'odham fiddle music to Kiowa, Lakota and Ute song. Alaska's track is “The Dear Little Butterfly” by Chuna McIntyre, a Yup'ik singer from the village of Eek.

Made at Brøderbund

“Surfin' USA Deluxe” was “written and performed by Broderbund staff composer Michael Barrett to recreate the style of early '60s surf music”; its note opens, “What could be more Californian than surf music?” Big Lou wrote two polkas: “Broderbund Polka”, filed with a note on Connecticut's Polish-American bands, and “Yoohoo Polka”, a Lawrence Welk homage. The notes call her a veteran of Polkacide, “the world's first punk polka band,” and a founder of Those Darned Accordions!; Wikipedia gives her name as Linda “Big Lou” Seekins and the band's as Those Darn Accordions. The fourth is “The Star-Spangled Banner”, arranged by Alex Tkaczevski.

The photographs

Two captioned photographs per location, 102 in all, from commercial stock: The Image Bank 52, Stock South 14, FPG International 10, SuperStock 7, Tony Stone Worldwide 3; two each from New Image, Photovault, Allstock, Photo File, Foster Travel Publishing and photographer P. Michael Whye; one each from Kreminski Photography, Jim Argo Photography, the Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism and the Missouri Division of Tourism. Captions are as plain as a slide tray: “Mardi Gras”, “Corn Palace”, “Car Henge”. The National Geographic photography and Folkways music that come up in descriptions of “Deluxe” are claims about the World game; the U.S.A. disc's credits name neither.

The Source Information program

The 1993 DOS CD ships SOURCE.EXE, and the Windows disc installs it as “Where in the USA...Source Information”. Its help text: “With this program you can listen to and learn about the music used with each state while viewing either the state's photos or its topographical map.” EYE icons switch between the map and the photos; an EAR icon opens the notes and plays the song. The 1995 README warns against running it alongside the game, since the two share data files. In the game, the Windows options menu calls the soundtrack what it is: “Turn Folk Songs Off.”