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The White Stripes
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Get Behind Me Satan
V2 Records
Release: 6/07/2005
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Rated:
Review by:
Jason Warner
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This review is late in coming. Get Behind Me
Satan has been out for several months now. This will
not be a review of an album you anticipate coming out,
because it's already out. However, this will be a review that
may help you decide whether or not to lay down your hard
earned cash to purchase the album for yourself.
Now, for those of you who recently found yourselves in a
pile on the ground after falling desperately from the turnip
truck, The White Stripes are a rock and roll band who has
critics either hating or loving them. They have a sound that
is at once both modern and retro, in a time when such a
description has become so passe as to render it all but
useless. What this means in laymen's terms is that they are
a modern rock band playing music that sounds like it could
be old. In fact much of what guitarist/songwriter Jack White
is playing, is old… basic rhythms, standard blues guitars riffs,
howling blues vocals in the Chicago and Delta blues styles.
The guitars are huge, the drums super basic, and on most
recordings there is no bass guitar. Previous albums from
The White Stripes have been full of rough, fuzzy two or three
minute pop songs complete with ear blistering solos, sloppy
drumming, and great vocal melodies, if sometimes
nonsensical lyrics. One friend of mine calls them Led
Zeppelin Junior, without all the sloppy Jimmy Page guitar
solos and neo-classical crooning of Robert Plant. I think it's
a pretty good description. However, much of the public,
critics, and average music fans have started to question The
White Stripes' staying power, and their use of this basic
formula on all their albums to date. While I personally don't
have a problem with the basic dirty rock format which the
Stripes use, I too was anxious to see where the group would
go after White Blood Cells, and the more
recent, Elephant.
When the first track from Get Behind Me Satan
was leaked on the Internet, I, along with thousands of others
quickly downloaded it in anticipation of the new album,
hoping this song would give us a hint as to the direction Jack
and Meg would be taking the group. "Blue Orchid" left me
pleasantly surprised. The sonic drill sounds of the octave
fuzz on the guitar are truly magnificent and had me super
excited for the full length album to arrive in my mailbox. I
had visions of sugarplums dancing in my head and all that…
except that the sugarplums were Jack and Meg White and
the dancing was really blowing my head off with their rock
and roll attack. Yeah, excited was an understatement. I am
one of the few that never thought The White Stripes were
lame in their take on garage rock… a genre of music my
friend reminds me has been around since "Louie, Louie." It
seems every time there is a new wave of garage rock there
are a bunch of people saying it is not original, etc. That's a
lame blanket statement with no basis.
So, Get Behind Me Satan arrived in my
mailbox. I nearly hurt myself tearing it from the wrapper
and throwing it like a Chinese star into my CD player. I
basked in the sound of "Blue Orchid" once again before
launching into track two, "The Nurse." And then my jaw
dropped. "Jack White, you wiley bastard! You tricked us all,
you sly devil." What met my ears was not more of the drill
car of rock going into my brain, but instead, a song carried
by the marimba, with sparse percussion, some tasteful bits
of exploding slide guitar, piano flourishes, and Jack's
gasoline soaked voice singing, ironically, "No I'm never
gonna let you down!" Indeed. Needless to say, Get
Behind Me Satan is much different than I had
anticipated. Here The White Stripes still use their basic
formula, but modify it with much more leaning on the piano
and acoustic guitars and much less face peeling electric
guitars. That is not to say that this album doesn't rock. It
does, and in some ways, the fact that it's mellow makes it
rock just that much harder. My personal favorite tracks are,
"The Denial Twist," a nice piano shuffle with a delicious vocal
melody, and a rare bass guitar, and "Take, Take, Take," an
acoustic guitar driven number with more power than 20
electric guitars going 20 miles an hour. The vocals on
Get Behind Me Satan are more haunting than
bluesy, although they still do retain the raspy, blues-inflected
signature of Mr. White.
So, Get Behind Me Satan is a new version of
The White Stripes, a more sophisticated, grown-up version.
If you haven't bought into The White Stripes hype up to this
point I can understand it. There is a certain kitsch to much
of what they have released in the past, a kitsch that I love,
but kitsch nonetheless. That said, Get Behind Me
Satan is an album not to be missed by any lovers of
music. It is vast, it is beautiful, and it is sitting on the shelf
of the record store waiting for you to buy it. Go now. |
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