Initially the White Stripes breakup news brought a bit of sadness to my already dark mood for the day (I live in Minnesota, what do you expect? Have you SEEN this winter?). It had become increasingly obvious (Jack’s comments a few months back about getting in the studio with Meg notwithstanding,) that the more time passed, the less likely a new White Stripes album would be made. After reading the very classy press release, I realized that this probably was for the best, and it’s not like Jack White was going to disappear in Third Man records and never come out again. I assume we will be seeing more of The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather, and I have a sneaky suspicion this is a new beginning, not only an end. As restless as Jack White seems to be, there can only be more bands and collaborations up his sleeve. I for one would love to see him induldge his folk and country leanings in a full length release, considering his love of classic country. He recently produced Wanda Jackson’s latest release, and has produced everyone from the Von Bondies to The Greenhornes and the legend Loretta Lynn (helping to bring her a Best Country Album Grammy in 2005). He will only continue to be in demand as a producer. Meg has recently been married, but I do hope she doesn’t disappear completely. While it’s true she may not have had the technical proficiency of many of her peers, there is NO doubt she was the perfect drummer for that band. I can’t even picture someone different in that chair. Sometimes things just fit with the right two people and this is the case here. I really will miss this band, as it seemed every release was an “event” that I looked forward too. I can’t say that about a lot bands, but they were on the short list.
At the end of “Under Great White Northern Lights” (one of the finer tour documents made in a long time,) there is a somewhat heartbreaking moment as Jack plays a gorgeous “White Moon” on the piano, bringing Meg to tears. For some reason, this seems fitting today. Thanks for the music and we appreciated every last bit of it.

Available now for your streaming pleasure.

Sea Of Cowards

Not all of this news is brand new, but it’s all worth knowing about. At least, if you’re me or like the same bands as I do.

• The Dead Weather Announce New Album Details – Jack White’s current project The Dead Weather is set to release their second album, following 2009′s widely-acclaimed Horehound. It will be called Sea of Cowards, and will drop May 11th in the US. Pitchfork has the cover art and track listing at the link.
• Tokyo Police Club Announce Sophomore LP – Must be the time for sophomore albums, because Toronto-based Tokyo Police Club are releasing theirs, entitled Champ, on June 8th. They’re also embarking on a pretty extensive tour, most of it with Passion Pit.
• The Libertines to Reunite for Festival Performances – The Libs were one of my favorite bands several years ago, and I always kind of hoped they’d get back together at some point following their well-publicized and not-particularly-amicable breakup in 2004. This isn’t any more than a couple of reunited festival gigs, no album or anything in the works, and I have a feeling even this has all kinds of possible badness in store for it – as much as I love Pete Doherty’s music, he’s not what you might call a stable person. Hope this comes off better than I fear.
• MGMT’s Congratulations Streaming on Their Site – MGMT’s new album comes out tomorrow, but it leaked early so they put the whole thing streaming on their home page. It seems a little more mellow than Oracular Spectacular, but I quite liked it. Not sure how long they’ll leave it up after the album’s out, so check it out while you can.
• Two More Broken Social Scene Songs from New Record – Two more songs from Broken Social Scene’s upcoming Forgiveness Rock Record have been released, and Steregum has the Flash player to prove it. I really REALLY like “All to All,” though “Forced to Love” needs some more time to percolate around my brain, I think. Forgiveness Rock Record is out May 4th.
• Jason Boesel Talks About In-Progress Rilo Kiley and Jenny Lewis Records – Now, when I heard that coming from Rilo Kiley drummer Boesel, I got REALLY REALLY excited; Rilo Kiley is my favorite band, and their last record together was 2006, before they all sort of amicably split up to work on solo projects. I’d like nothing better than for them to get back together and work on something new. This is not quite that. The Rilo Kiley record is a rarities and B-sides compilation, which is still worth excitement, because they have a lot of B-sides and songs they’ve only done live that I’d LOVE to have in studio-produced form. Jenny is working on a new record with her boyfriend Johnathan Rice, but it’s unclear from the interview whether that means he’s working on her record, she’s working on his, or they’re doing a dual one (they’ve both worked on each other’s records before). Boesel is encouraging, though, that Rilo Kiley may reunite for a new project in the future, something I certainly hope comes true.

Director: Emmett Malloy
Producer: Mike Sarkissian
Starring: Jack White, Meg White
MPAA Rating: 14A
Running time: 93 min.

Since it’s about six months from the time I actually watched this move at the Toronto International Film Festival, it’s safe to say I’ve probably forgotten a lot of the details in the movie. But I do remember the overall impact the film had on me. With the release of the awesome looking special edition DVD set releasing next month (March 16th), I thought it prudent to jot down my thoughts on the film today.

As the lights came up after screening Under Great White Northern Lights, the director took to the stage to answer any questions the audience might have. One of the patrons loudly declared to us all that this was the best rock doc he’s seen in thirty years. While I think that statement is beyond bold (bordering on ridiculous), I can at least understand the sentiment. I recently declared Jack White the artist of the decade and those of us that are fans can understand why. Under Great White Northern Lights is just one more notch on the belt of The White Stripes’ legacy.

In the summer of 2007, The White Stripes started quite the non-traditional North American tour that covered, first and foremost, at least one city in every provincial territory in Canada. Some of these shows were sold out, 20,000 seat arenas and others were impromptu jams in a pool hall or a sing-a-long on an unsuspecting metro bus line. Film maker Emmett Malloy was there to capture it all. In fact, in one of the oddest displays of absurdity, pompousness and unconditional fan loyalty, the film opens with The White Stripes now infamous, one note show; in which the band plays literally only one note for a crowd of screaming fans who couldn’t be happier.

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Recorded at Jack White’s “Third Man Records and Novelties” that popped up in the city in August, “Live From Third Man West” is a new five-song/four-video digital EP from The Dead Weather that is now available on iTunes. Along with highlights from the band’s debut LP “Horehound”, the EP features a cover of “Forever My Queen”, originally recorded by doom metal overlords Pentagram. Full tracklist is below.

01 Forever My Queen (Pentagram cover) (audio)
02 Hang You From the Heavens
03 I Cut Like a Buffalo
04 So Far From Your Weapon
05 Treat Me Like Your Mother
06 Hang You From the Heavens (live video)
07 I Cut Like a Buffalo (live video)
08 So Far From Your Weapon (live video)
09 Treat Me Like Your Mother (live video)

Thanks to PitchFork for the heads-up.

My big vacation this year that I’m really looking forward to is a headfirst dive into the whirlwind of cinema known as The Toronto International Film Festival. Several titles have already been announced and I’ve already started the “weeding out” process. Out of hundreds (thousands?) of films being shown, I’ll only be seeing thirty, so choosing carefully will be obviously important and difficult.

Right off the bat I usually discount documentaries as a style of film making that isn’t really my cup of tea (in general – Anvil! fucking rocked!). But one film I keep teetering back and forth on whether I want to see or not is called Under Great White Northern Lights, which documents “The White Stripes” tour across Canada. Unfortunately this trailer doesn’t help my decision at all. I like the look of the all black and white seascape, but it doesn’t give me much to go on in terms of “plot” – for lack of a better word.

Thanks to The Documentary Blog for the heads up on the trailer, but dammit, I need more information before I decide to spend 2 of my precious 60 hours of viewing time on Jack White.

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As previously opined here on RowThree, Horehound, the debut album from The Dead Weather is quickly becoming one of my favorites of 2009. Track five, “Treat Me Like Your Mother” got the video treatment by director Jonathan Glazer and premiered on Cinemax a few nights ago. Since I don’t have Cinemax and since I missed their performance at the legendary First Ave. on Monday night, I have to settle for the YouTube version – which I gotta say is simplistically awesome.

Watch Jack White and Alison Mosshart duel it out with fully automatic machine guns as they walk towards one another in a “Terminator-esque” sequence. The rhythm of the song mashing with the gun caps is pretty killer – no pun intended. Bloodied and exhausted, the two part ways once the clips have been emptied. It is the definition of cool; admittedly in part because of Glazer’s style and tone of the video. Check it out below. Then go buy the album.

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Jack White is playing the drums? Yeah and it fucking awesome. The new record from The Dead Weather seems to be really shaking up the music world and I can see why. One, because as mentioned White isn’t playing guitar and two, this album just might be better than anything The White Stripes have put out… though the jury is still out on that one. I know I’ve been listening to the album pretty much non-stop since I acquired it last week after seeing a pretty great performance on the Jimmy Fallon show (see that clip under the seats).

The album itself is just as raw as their live sound and I particularly enjoy the b-sides of the album. Perhaps it is fortuitous that I happen to be in the midst of a “chick as the lead vocalist” kick at the moment and The Dead Weather have an angry yet beautiful female voice at the helm in Alison Mosshart. The beats are solid and there is some really interesting mix of sounds coming from the two stringed instruments and the keyboard. For an example of this unique sound check out track number eight, “Bone House.” Having just said I dig the singer, I actually really like the instrumental track as well: “3 Birds”; which is maybe my favorite on the album.

Do yourself a favor and pick up this album which is sure to be on many many top tens come December 31.
Band Home page.

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(cross-published from RowThree.com)

I had not even heard about this documentary until I found the poster today. And I’m so glad I did. The movie focuses on three distinct guitar players from their generation: Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin), The Edge (U2) and Jack White (The White Stripes).

For Page, rock is like sex and the guitar his woman. For Edge, music something to manipulate and experiment with technically. For White, music is a raw fight of emotion and struggle. Three distinct viewpoints, technique and style. Complete with full interviews and rock footage, I’m going out on a limb that this is one film you’ll want a nice sound system for. IMAX anyone?

The movie revolves around a day when Jimmy Page, Jack White, and The Edge first met and sat down together to share their stories. We visit legendary locations and delve into musical rebellion. This looks top notch. Check out a nice big version of the poster below the seats…
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As almost all years, there was a high amount of quality, an extraordinary amount of undeserved hype (Vampire Weekend, Fleet Foxes, Black Kids to name a few), and it also had a few disappointments (The Hold Steady, Coldplay).  

Here’s ten of what I consider the quality of the year. 

1) Bon Iver- “For Emma, Forever Ago”

Typically not the kind of thing I go for.   Lo-fi, unpolished, almost sounds like a demo.   Thank God I let this one in to my head this year.   I can’t shake these songs.   Delivered with such feeling it’s impossible to not be drawn in.   Every song stands on it’s own, but they all work together to form a brilliant whole. Many nights while laying in bed, these songs would play in my head.   A haunting work.

2) Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds- “Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!”

In 1994, I got to see a Nick Cave show at Lollapalooza that I liked, but my attention was severely distracted as I was waiting for the Smashing Pumpkins later in the day.   Too bad I was so young because I’m sure if I had been paying attention and knew who Nick Cave was, it wouldn’t have taken me years to “find” him.   A defining album of what Nick Cave is.   A stunning lyrical work taken alone, but you can’t give short shrift to the Bad Seeds and what really holds the album together, the music.

3) Kings of Leon- “Only By The Night”

Every so often, a record will come by and take you by complete surprise.   While I’ve never been a huge KOL fan, I am now.   This is EXACTLY how I like my rock & roll, huge and ambitious.

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