The White Stripes - Get Behind Me Satan

[DudeAsInCool]

POP MUSIC • Little White truths

Inspired and determined, Jack White gets personal, crafting a White Stripes CD so surprising it recalls the Beatles' creative leap on "Rubber Soul."

The White Stripes' Jack White is ready for a break as he slips behind the wheel of his vintage four-seat Thunderbird and switches on the ignition. White has been working feverishly on a new album, and he is just days away from starting a grueling world tour.

The CD, "Get Behind Me Satan," is a a daring creative advance in which he and drummer Meg White have added layers of imagination and depth to what was an already thrilling sound.

Read more or listen to the review here:

http://www.calendarlive.com/music/cl-ca-wh...top-blurb-right

[KiwiCoromandel]

Mr White is more than just a swaggering blues-rock riff monster. Bernard Zuel has the proof.

Where do you sit on the "repeat the winning formula versus confound expectations" question? Your answer could be important as you approach the new album by Jack and Meg White.

If you are resolute your favourite band should stick to what they did best last time, you're going to be banging your head by halfway through Get Behind Me Satan. Weren't the Stripes supposed to be a guitar band, a hard-edge-of-blues band, a - damn it - noisy rock band?

After the glam-tinged power chords and falsetto of Blue Orchid, Get Behind Me Satan is as likely to feature piano, marimba, acoustic guitar and soul music as blues/rock crunch. Its tempo is more often slow, its tunes are more often crooned - for example, listen to Jack in full yearn mode in Forever For Her.

The attitude is more often introspective than the familiar strut. Oh, yes ... and Meg sings. Briefly.

You don't have to wait long for this all to become obvious, either. The second song, The Nurse, features jagged but brief slashes of guitar across a bed of moody marimba as Jack murmurs "no I'm never going to let you down". Later, in Little Ghost, the bluegrass twang suggests Jack took more away from the set of Cold Mountain than Renee Zellweger.

Of course, it's not like they have gone John Mayer on us: Instinct Blues grinds into the Clarkesdale dirt gloriously.

Yet you could ask - are the White Stripes dull without the pushy, if not arrogant, swagger?

I don't think so, but then I fall on the confound expectations side of things and think Jack can write a tune, not just a riff.

review:Bernard Zuel