white stripes by ally

A Week With The White Stripes' "Icky Thump": Day 2

31 July 2007
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Words by David Bevan // Illustration by Ally Trigg

So, Jack and Meg roared through Canada. The played classrooms and arenas, and even took a few minutes to blow the minds of all those that opted to take Winnipeg public transit on one magical afternoon in Manitoba. How awesome is that? Seriously. Think it over. Jack worked on-stage magic in the confines of a bucket seat and Meg rolled her head along her shoulders in the very same fashion she would were she beating skins in a garage or the Garden.

The shoestring guitar lines that bind together “You Don’t Know What Love Is” still continue to feature prominently in each subsequent spin. It is savory, deep-fried comfort listening, deserving of a successor much more jaunty, much less cool. “300 M.P.H Torrential Outpour Blues” is very much the latter and to the listener wanting more juice, it’s an unwelcome repast in Kinksville when all you want is some more neck-throttling and teeth-gnashing. It feels itchy, difficult to wear or sit through without fidgeting terribly, the thud and Wurlitzer flourishes feeling much more like a couple addled by indifference for one another than one that can’t seem to buy enough condoms. Thank all things holy then, for “Conquest,” White’s reworking of the Patti Page original. It churns and rumbles in the way you’d imagine a White re-imagining would: Meg’s snare hits are made all the more concussive by the addition of mariachi trumpet blasts, Jack throwing on the jets with his tongue and fingers. Dude kicks things off with a war-cry and never lets up. If only they could have managed to squeeze that into their bus-trip set list.

The entire Canadian affair and Icky Thump encapsulates well the still-growing success the Stripes have had since they arrived on the scene strands of their own peculiar brand of spontaneity, of unpredictability fused with the familiar laced throughout. No matter which studio method they employ or stringless instrument they throw into the mix, it still gives you the urge to nod your head a bit. The White Stripes’s pixie dust is of a consistency that translates to any format — even if you can’t scrounge together a mariachi band in Winnipeg at the last minute.

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*

Conquest has been my favourite song on the album so far. Some of the songs are just too long for their own good and I find myself bored in the middle. Quality over quantity next time, Jack.

Jesse | 2 August 2007

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