Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. DVIII--The White Stripes: Effect and Cause

Friday, Wednesday...whatever....

This week's tune was the last song on the last studio album this week's band recorded before disbanding.  It was a lovely way to go....

I wrote about the White Stripes in Jukebox, Vol. CXVI (seven--seven!--years ago), and for many years it was the second least viewed music post I ever wrote (not enough cool kids reading emaycee's blog!).  God only knows why it was so low for such a killer band, but over the past couple of years its page views have leapt up to respectable (for a half-assed blog written by an amateur musicologist).  Nothing much to add as the band remains happily defunct, though I would like to note that the White Stripes were nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility (2023) and were not inducted.  To which I can only say:  What.  The.  Fuck?

"Effect and Cause" was not released as a single (should have been!), though not from a lack of trying as the band released four singles from the rather surprisingly named Icky Thump.  The album debuted at number two on the Billboard 200, making it the highest charting in America of their career.  However, it debuted at number one in Great Britain (so many cool kids in the U.K. need to be reading emaycee's blog!).

Fun Fact: The album got its title from an exclamation of surprise in Lancashire (a county in northern England where Jack White's second wife is from, who is said to have used the exclamation):  ecky thump.  The band claims to have changed it to icky to make it more appealing to Americans, but there were also copyright concerns as it gained fame from being used in a British TV comedy, The Goodies.

"Effect and Cause" is a testament to how much Jack and Meg White could do with so little.  Featuring nothing more than a metallic acoustic guitar and some snappy drums, Jack gives an inspired vocal performance that is the embodiment of an all-knowing smart ass.  The lyrics are comprised of clever turns of phrase and plays on cliches that stream forth like a rollicking preacher's sermon, as the protagonist commiserates over a lost lover.  Every time I hear this song it calls to mind classic rock from the seventies, and I'm sure that if it had been released in that decade it would have been a staple on every AOR FM station in America.  Alas, it wasn't, and it's left to me to educate pop music fans on its wonder--which, come to think of it, isn't a bad calling at all....

Lyric Sheet:  "Well I ain't saying I'm innocent, in fact the reverse/But if you're headed to the grave, you don't blame the hearse/You're like a little girl yellin' at her brother 'cause you lost his ball..."

Enjoy: 

Republicans = Nazis

Peace,

emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CXXX--The Raconteurs: Steady, As She Goes

While there have been quite a few songs since the turn of the century that I've quite enjoyed, I'd be hard pressed to remember one that I enjoyed more than I've enjoyed this week's tune.

And to those who say it sounds like a White Stripes tune (not surprisingly, as Jack White sings lead vocals and plays lead guitar), I counter with...ain't nothin' wrong with that.

The seeds of the Raconteurs were formed in Nashville in 2005 when old friends Jack White and Brendan Benson got together and wrote "Steady, As She Goes."  Later that year they were joined by Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler of Detroit band The Greenhornes (not familiar) in the Motor City and between their full-time gigs managed to record an album's worth of tunes.  They followed with a tour (including being an opening act for Nobel Prize laureate, Bob Dylan), and another album in 2008.  They have reunited here and there since, and in 2014 got together and started on another album but it remains uncompleted and it's uncertain whether they will return as a foursome.  Nonetheless, all four continue to make and play music successfully for a living and one supposes it's hard to complain much about that.

Released on their Broken Boy Soldiers LP in 2006, "Steady, As She Goes" would go on to be a minor hit here in the states (#54--with a bullet!--on The Billboard Hot 100), but do considerably better in Canada (#3) and the UK (#4), probably because they're so much cooler than we are.  Both the album and the single would earn the Raconteurs Grammy nominations, and the song ended up on numerous year end best of compilations for 2006.

Starting with an ominous drum count, "Steady, As She Goes" moves into a funky ass bass line which sounds very much borrowed from Joe Jackson's "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" (what the hell--if you're going to borrow, might as well be from a good one), before running headlong into some bitchin' guitar work from Jack White, a staccato scratch of the strings that plays well with the bass.  The chorus moves into power chord heaven with some great backing vocals from Brendan Benson (I don't know a lot of Benson's solo work, but from what I've heard, despite the comparisons to the White Stripes, Benson's influence can definitely be heard in the chorus--for those not in the know, Benson's "What" is well worth a listen).  You may notice I've stayed away from the song's lyrics--that's partly intentional as the song seems to me to be the chiding of an acquaintance who may have married more for stability than love and I'm pretty sure there have been people married for worse reasons, but what the hell do I know.  Anyway, it all adds up to a power pop dream of a song, with guitar, bass, and drums becoming so much more than the sum of their parts, and a catchy as all hell chorus that'll (thankfully) stay with you for days.

Lyric Sheet:  "But no matter what you do, you'll always feel as though you tripped and fell/So steady as she goes...."

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee

Friday Night Jukebox, Vol. CXVI--The White Stripes: Ball and Biscuit

Today we're going to feature the best 1970's band not to actually record in the 1970's....

Another in a long line of artists that I was introduced to by my daughter (she sent me a copy of their album  White Blood Cells and after hearing "Fell in Love with a Girl" I fell in love with The White Stripes),  The White Stripes are arguably the best band rock and roll has seen in the last twenty years.  From their beginning in my adoptive home of Detroit, Michigan in 1997, Jack White and Meg White (they claimed to be siblings but were actually married from 1996-2000) literally set the pop music world on its ear.  Though they only released six albums, two of them ended up on Rolling Stone's list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time."  They were critical and fan favorites, sold several million records, won six Grammy Awards, and were widely regarded as an exceptional live band.  The weight of fame eventually became too much for the very introverted Meg White, and they went their separate ways in 2011--but they had a hell of a ride for fourteen years.

Fun Fact:  The White Stripes got their name not only from Meg White's last name (Jack Gills took his wife's name when they got married), but also from the fact that Meg really liked peppermint candies.  Fascinating, my God...

Released on what is widely considered their best album, Elephant (and I wouldn't disagree) in 2003, "Ball and Biscuit" is most amazing to me for being the type of song I usually hate:  it's long, it has a lot of guitar solos, it's bluesy, and it's about drugs.  And yet I adore it--and such is the magic of The White Stripes.  Clocking in at a little over seven minutes, "Ball and Biscuit" is an amalgamation of Jack White's otherworldly guitar playing (needless to say, he's one of my all time favorite guitarists), Meg White's understated but evocative drumming, and Jack White's matter of fact yet yearning, cocksure yet vulnerable, vocals. It's the love song of a drug addled man, sung to an unimpressed drug addled woman, and in the hands of The White Stripes, it's a reminder of just how soul ravaging the blues can be.

Lyric Sheet:  "It's quite possible that I'm your third man, girl/But it's a fact that I'm the seventh son..."

Enjoy:

Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee