The album was produced by lead singer, songwriter and founding member Brian Carpenter with Bryce Goggin (Akron/Family, Antony and the Johnsons, Bishop Allen) and marks the second release in Carpenter's "Weird American Gothic" trilogy.

Album Illustrations are by Carson Ellis, best known for her artwork for The Decemberists and children's books such as The Mysterious Benedict Society. Singer Larkin Grimm (whose Parplar CD Carpenter performed on) and cellist Julia Kent (Antony and the Johnsons) are special guests who appear throughout the album.

Multi-instrumentalist Brian Carpenter began writing Boy From Black Mountain shortly after his son was diagnosed with autism in late 2006. A number of songs such as "Boy From Black Mountain" and "Saturn Song" (a duet with Grimm) were inspired by the experience of living with his son during the time of his diagnosis and treatment. Other compositions were inspired by the lives of his father and grandparents, watermelon farmers in the rural Bible Belt; their titles are drawn from works of classic Southern Gothic literature while the sound is deeply influenced by venerable regional musical traditions. "As I Lay Dying," for instance, is a hillbilly foot-stomper wreathed in Gothic atmosphere. "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" is based on the life of Brian's father growing up in the Florida panhandle.