Okay, I admit this post is basically directed towards LLC because he and I have had conversations about the White Stripes before, but I'm posting it publicly because you never know who else out there might be a fan.

The reason for this post is that I have decided, after five or six times listening to the new album Icky Thump, Jack and Meg White are Gods. I love this new CD. The first time I listened to it I thought "Eh" then the second time I thought "Eh?" The third time I let my girlfriend listen to it and she said "Eh" and I thought "Wow".

After five or six times, I can't stop listening to it. There is just enough odd guitar playing and Jack White's voice to keep me interested and eventually enthralled to the point that I can't stop listening to it.

My only gripe, and it's not much of one, is that Meg White on the drums is fairly disappointing. Without a Bass player she, as usual, plays the most basic of drums. However, it works for Rock 'N Roll. So, the White Stripes are my favorite band of the month.

The White Stripes are one of my favorite bands of all time; Jack White is an inspiration on guitar because the bulk of his riffs are really minimalistic and mostly comprise of power-chords and simple non-arrpeggiated chords... It has a real punk rock intensity to it that is just so simplistic. Yet, when he solos, he does some of the best solos I've ever heard that require an immense amount of talent to play or mimic. And I love Meg's drumming for it's simplicity and child-like quality. She may not be John Bonham, but she lays it down like a mad-woman.

Funny, I heard someone compare Jack to John Mayer the other day, as they seem to be two of the only directly blues-influenced guitarists in pop music currently. But the thing is, John Mayer is decent. His early work is radio-friendly little-girl pop, and is absolutely horrid. But his last album and his new band, The John Mayer Trio, seem to be genuine children of serious musicianship. But here is the thing; John Mayer is like the equivalent to the white man's bastardization of the blues. Jack White, despite his skin color, is the real deal. He throws it down like an African American man with a slide guitar sitting on his porch in 1935. Jack takes an Airline guitar--a guitar made out of hollow PLASTIC that was originally sold in Sears in the 60s for about $15--makes it his number-one live guitar, plugs it into a whammy pedal (pitch shifter for those who aren't guitar-savvy) and he makes the most soulful blues I've heard since the 60s. He's a genius, the way he keeps his music so pure.

Anyways, I rank their work like this:
1.) The White Stripes (1999)
2.) Elephant (2003)
3.) De Stijl (2000)
4.) Icky Thump (2007)
5.) White Blood Cells (2001)
6.) Get Behind Me Satan (2005)

Hey, Blibble, if you dig the stripes, check out The Greenhornes. They're probably the second best band to come out of the same Mid-West Garage-Rock revival scene as the Stripes. They have a really cool 60s acid-blues sound to them. They actually sound exactly like they wrote, performed, and recorded all of their work about thirty years ahead of their time.

Yeh, I'm diggin the Icky Thump.

I used to only be a casual White Stripes fan.. but I got the rest of their albums recently, and have been listening to them nonstop.

I'd love to see them live.

I love White Stipes

White stripes I can take or leave...

"It was Ecky Thump... But we changed it to Icky, with an 'I', so the teenager's will think, 'oh, that's yucky'"

That Jools Holland interview I posted in the youtube thread is hilarious. "KAISER CHIEFS, DO YOUR ROADIES WEAR TIES!?"

Jools Holland and Jack White are two of the most awkward white men I've ever seen.

Speaking of good youtube/White Stripes material, this is amazing:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=1Kme7MAVVDI

It's The Stripes playing a montage of Rag and Bone and Screwdriver at this years Bonnaroo. It's great; my favorite song off of the new album, and my favorite song off of the first album. I'll post the entire show in the youtube thread later on.

Speaking of John Mayer, I was "lucky" enough to go to a free John Mayer/Sheryl Crow concert in the VIP section. Up until this point, I've always gone to small venue shows where I have to take a beating in order to stand within decent view of the drunk punk band wobbling around on stage.

This whole VIP treatment was strange. We had a table in our own little booth at the Concord Pavillion where waiters would come by and take our orders for drinks and gourmet food. I couldn't get over this fact. When I'm usually at punk shows fighting with fifteen year olds who managed to sneak in and think their tough guys by flailing their arms at girls in the mosh pit (Oh I could go into some good stories here), I couldn't get over the fact that I'm sitting with a crowd surrounding me consisting of middle-aged couples drinking expensive wine being served to them by waiters. A concert with waiters? What the...

John Mayer was actually pretty good, and that comparison of him to Jack White is interesting. You described him perfectly. He is Jack White for the baby boomers. These same people would probably piss themselves at a White Stripes concert. That's not saying John Mayer is horrible, he's just horrible to the younger crowd I guess.

Sheryl Crow was horrible.

I live for small-time punk and ska shows. I'm just pissed that I missed Big D and the Kids Table last winter when they showed up. But, I'm going to go see Reel Big Fish in a cardboard box, basically, next month. It's just depressing, because we had this really small punk rock club around here called Saratoga Winners that was shut down recently for serving liquor without a license, and serving to minors. The place had no heating, and in the winter, you had to show up in full outdoor winter dress, or you'd freeze. The sound quality was crap, and from the handful of times my band played there, I can say that it was even worse on stage. It was like a battle field, trying to hear everyone in your band play. The sound guy was a dick. The owner barely spoke English... It was a fucking great place. And now it's gone. I'm 17, and I feel like I already have milestones of my childhood, which is fucking ridiculous.

I'm a bit disappointed to see that this is the first big-ish White Stripes tour. They've always played in small hole-in-the-wall clubs. I guess they're doing Madison Square Garden this year. Usually when they come to New York, they always do small, sketchy clubs in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Whatever, I'll see them any place, any time. And Jack White isn't over-weight or dressing like Zorro this year, so I don't have to worry about wondering why Fat Zorro is on stage spitting on Meg.

It's safe to say that 2005 was the year Jack White lost and then reclaimed his sanity.

By the way, is anyone a fan of Jack White's other band, The Raconteurs? It's a psychedelic-rock band made in the style of 1960s San Francisco rock meets early Mid-West punk rock. It's something of a superstar line-up of Mid-West garage rockers. It comprises of White, the bassist and drummer of The Greenhornes, and Brendan Benson, a solo artist from somewhere in the Mid-west.

They're pretty cool. They have a cool psychedelic feel mixed with that classic Jack White "I hate technology and anything made after 1977" feel. I'll make it a point to post some of their stuff in the youtube thread while I'm posting a mass amount of Stripes performances.

Yeah, the Raconteurs are great. Even though it's a good song I got tired of hearing "Steady as She Goes" on the radio a million times. They are a good band though. I think it's Jack Whites temporary escape, where he doesn't have to necessarily be the center of attention while on stage playing because the other guys are good on their own. I'm waiting for their second album to see how they progress.

Yeah... I feel like he kind of wanted to escape from the character he had created for himself in the stripes. That is, it's quite obvious he's not just himself when he's playing with Meg... I think the perfect example of this is how, whenever he plays a Stripes show, he never uses his normal speaking voice when on stage. He always forces sort of a Black man's New Orleans accent.

He's still sort of the center of attention within the Raconteurs though, just on the basis that the White Stripes are really the only garage-punk band from the Mid-West to recieve attention on a national level. Too bad, actually. I think the Greenhornes have such a cool sound.

Yeah i like the White Stripes..
Jack White is a bit of an oddball but he is a talented one!

A bit like me

Did you ever hear about how in 2005, he disowned his hometown of Detroit, moved to London, and legally changed his name to III Quid? He made threats of violence to whomever refered to him as "Jack" while in his presence. Then after a week, he decided to move back to Detroit, changed his name back to Jack White, but decided he would prefer it if people call him "Jackie" but only when they see him walking down the street or in public. This was also the year that he decided to, improptu (as he does with every song they play live) go into a particular song at a show, and Meg didn't recognize it off the bat, and sort of messed up the drum part. So, Jack walked over to her drumset, spat on her, and went into a different song.

And, again, I'm glad that whole Fat Zorro thing is over. 2005 was an odd year for him.

Someone on youtube put together a nice compilation from each of the first five albums..

The White Stripes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjM8N75Rcsg&mode=related&search=

De Stijl
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSN_c7Bi0-g&mode=related&search=

White Blood Cells
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijuJ6O7PPmA&mode=related&search=

Elephant
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qgb35S04b0Q&mode=related&search=

Get Behind Me Satan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZp53fprLa4&mode=related&search=

See i knew he was an oddball

Yeah. He seems a little bit better now. I think The Raconteurs let him escape from all the sudden fame that came about when they released Elephant.

now that you mentioned, I realize how stupid I am because the only song from the Raconteurs I've heard is "Steady as she goes" - which I loved - but I've been too lazy to search for the whole stuff.

same thing with Icky Thump, and all of the recent White Stripes albums. the singles were nowhere as good as those ones from White Blood Cells and I just assumed they are past their peak. they were amazing in "Pretty Good Looking" (from the De Stijl album I believe) and in the whole White Blood Cells album, which is amazing.

Well, I think the first four albums are sacred gems among their other material. In fact, I've ranked Icky Thump above White Blood Cells, but I can guarantee that's just temporary, until the amusement of a new album wears off. But, I don't think there is a single weak spot on Elephant. There are so many great songs on there... "There's No Home For You Here," "Black Math," "Ball and Biscuit," "Litte Acorns," "Hypnotize," "I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself" are just a few of the amazing tracks that album has to offer. But, I still feel the debut album captures the essence of The White Stripes the best.

2005's Get Behind Me Satan was a cool idea, but sort of weak. I kept thinking back to all those interviews from years past in which Jack White stated that the point of the band was to never evolve and "keep a good thing going". But that album was a departure for sure, and not necessarily a good one.

Icky Thump seems to be back on track. "Rag and Bone" and "I'm Slowly Turning Into You" are the two highlights of the album, but overall it seems to be a return to something between White Blood Cells and Elephant, approached with the experimentalism of Get Behind Me Satan (only this time it works). As I've said, Jack's physical appearance is very symbolic of the band's evolution. His hair kept getting longer and longer, until he started eating Mariachi bands and wearing their clothes, hence becoming "Fat Zorro" and then moving on to the totally bizarre and misguided Get Behind Me Satan. Now Jack has lost the weight he put on, cut his hair, shaved his mustache, and is sporting red t-shirts and red Dickies work-pants. And, coincidently, the music is a return to blues-rock.

Yea I did enjoy this album for what it was. They're always trying new things within a few styles and thats hard. It's way better than they're last album.

Hey, I just noticed there is an Icky Thump ad at the bottom of the page.

Aren't cookies funny like that?