The White Stripes: An Album a Day

An Album a Day is posted 5 days a week, Monday-Friday

In honor of Jack White's birthday this past weekend I thought I'd take a look at his first album with his first band The White Stripes. Similarly to another punk influenced band, Green Day, The White Stripes debut album is extremely dirty, grainy and lo fi to the extent of sounding more like a collection of demos than a studio album. Unlike Green Day however, the style of The White Stripes actually works really well with all of the grime. It was clear right from the beginning that the White Stripes were a raw and nasty sounding punk band who loved the blues.

    Before we get too deep into this review let me state, I am a huge Jack White fan. Jack White makes up about 75% of my interest in learning the guitar and the gear that I’ve bought for my guitar. Despite this, I wasn’t much of a White Stripes fan until fairly recently; while Icky Thump was the first time I heard White I was way more into his two solo albums before I ever went back and listened to anything else from The White Stripes. Ironically, one of the things that I love about The White Stripes now is what turned me off of them in the first place, noise.

    While the production would get better on their later albums, The White Stripes were always a noisey band, being heavy in the most non metal way possible. The perfect example of this can be seen in the only single to come off of this album The Big Three Killed My Baby. This track features Jack White and his guitar competing to see who can scream louder at the big three auto manufactures that he blames for ruining his hometown of Detroit. This is one of the few songs where Jack White sound legitimately angry as well as being one of the few songs he’s written that is clearly about his own personal experiences.

    Along with standout original tracks such as I Fought Piranhas, Jimmy The Exploder and Astro, The White Stripes debut also features multiple covers. Jack shows off his blues influences with a reworking of the Robert Johnson song Stop Breakin’ Down Blues entitled simply Stop Breaking Down. Along with covering Johnson, White also included lines from his favorite bluesman Son House, utilizing the chorus of John The Revelator in Cannon. And last in his trio of blues covers is a semi gothic piano rendition of the blues standard St. James Infirmary Blues.

    Along with these blues covers, this album also features a cover of Bob Dylan’s One More Cup of Coffee. The cover is played fairly straight, only deviating in Jack’s style of guitar playing. After listening to both versions I would have been perfectly okay never hearing the Bob Dylan version, and I actually like Dylan.

This entire album has the band wearing their influences on their sleeve, from the blues covers and punk attitude to the smattering of folk influences. Interestingly, this album is a lot like White’s solo album Lazaretto in that it can work as a rosetta stone for all of his other work. Both albums feature folk songs that are similar to the style of The Raconteurs and gothic tracks that are similar to The Dead Weather.

Unlike the previous first album I reviewed from Twenty One Pilots, it is clear that Jack and Meg had their sound and their identity down by the time they recorded this record. The only thing that would really change between this album and The White Stripes later work is production value, but in all honesty this music works fines with hum, buzz and noise. I wouldn’t say this is my favorite White Stripes album, but it is a strong contender for second place.

Album on Third Man Records

Album on Google Play

Album on ITunes

Album on Amazon

Paramore After Laughter: An Album a Day

An Album a Day is posted 5 days a week, Monday-Friday

Today we’re looking at former pop punk band Paramore’s latest foray into pop, After Laughter. Given Paramore’s pop punk roots, a switch to a new wave inspired sound to stay viable actually makes a lot of sense. Given new wave’s status as cleaned up and family friendly punk rock as well as the recent resurgence of 80’s music being popular this switch should work very well for Paramore.

Firstly, let me just say I was never a huge Paramore fan; I liked most of their hits but every time I'd listen to their deeper cuts off the albums I would always get bored quickly. In fairness, that's how I felt about most pop punk and emo bands of the 2000s, from Fall Out Boy to My Chemical Romance I always found the deeper cuts to be lacking. The only album by those sort of bands I liked the whole way through was Panic! At The Disco’s latest album Death of a Bachelor.

Over the course of listening to Paramore I've found tha the handful of songs I like from them I absolutely love, but everything is else is kind of forgettable. Needless to say I wasn't expecting much from this album; I really like the lead single Hard Times, but I usually do like their singles. Hard Times was still way more interesting than most of Paramore’s music because it promised a manic depressed 80’s new wave tribute sound across the album. That genre, and the way they handled it on Hard Times did give me hope that this album would be strong all the way through.

After listening to the full album I find myself torn. Part of me really likes the new wave sound throughout the album, the added synths and funk bass lines absolutely match Paramore perfectly. But part of me feels the same about this album as every other Paramore album. Despite the new wave polish they sound exactly like Paramore always has to me, pretty average with occasionally great songs.

For some reason, even with replacing the punk guitars with synths and funk bass most of this album felt just as familiar as anything else Paramore have done. Don't get me wrong it’s a solid album with 4 or 5 really good songs on it, but the stuff that isn't really good feels almost like background noise to me. Just like their past albums, I either get bored with the worse songs or just forget them as soon as they end.

The highlights are Hard Times, Rose Colored Boy, Pool, Grudges and Caught In The Middle. Hard Times and Pool are the most blatantly 80’s tracks on this album, combing really cool synths that sound like a mix of xylophone and wind chimes with a funk bassline and drum beat. The guitar is pretty sparse on these tracks, adding texture rather than being the main instrument, but it works perfectly within the context of the song.

Rose Colored Boy, Grudges and Caught In The Middle are an interesting mix of punk and new wave. These tracks mix more aggressive guitar riffing reminiscent of their early album with the new wave inspired sound of this album. These tracks feel like the best of both worlds for Paramore, keeping the aggression of their early sound and mixing it with the elegance of their poppier sound. To me, this is Paramore at their best.

I'd have to say this album is a mixed bag to me; featuring some of my favorite Paramore songs as well as ones I forget even exist the moment they stop. The blend of new wave with their sound works better than a lot of what they've tried before, but a lot of tracks just sound like filler between the great tracks. Ultimately I think this album is worth a listen, but after one listen I simply pick out the 5 tracks I like and pretend the rest don’t exist.

Album on Google Play

Album on ITunes

Album on Amazon

Bitch Magnet Star Booty: An Album A Day

An Album A Day is posted 5 days a week, Monday-Friday

Today’s album and band are not the type of band you’ll find on many top 10 lists; hell you’ll be hard pressed to find anybody who’s heard of them who didn’t come up in the same scene as they did. Bitch Magnet were a three piece post hardcore band that often strayed into noise rock territory. I first discovered the band’s story through a book entitled Your Band Sucks that was written by the band’s guitarist Jon Fine; throughout the book, Fine tells the tale of his various experiences in bands with the first serious one being Bitch Magnet.

While the name might offend some people’s sensibilities it’s pretty much par for the course for the hardcore punk inspired indie scene that the band came up in. While both lead singer/ bassist Sooyoung Park  and Fine would go on to create more progressive minded music both within and without the band, Star Booty is a mostly straightforward rage filled rock fest of an album. Despite the obvious hardcore punk influences throughout the album, Star Booty does manage to be much more listenable than your average Minor Threat song.

Of the entire album the only track I’m not terribly fond of is Circle K as it snaps you out of the almost meditative state the rest of the album puts you in. Similarly to shoegaze bands like My Bloody Valentine I find that the wall of noise created by the heavily distorted guitar and bass becomes almost soothing after a while, as the noise just kind of washes over you.

While Carnation and Cantaloupe are good opening and closing tracks respectively, the strongest chunk of the album is from Chord through Knucklehead. Each of these songs flow together in such a way that they have the feel of one long musical piece, rather than four separate songs.

The version of this album that can be found on Itunes, Google Play and Spotify is a deluxe edition that includes remastered versions of other EPs and singles the band released. Of these the only one I find particularly good is Big Pining, but none of them are bad per se. Overall this is a killer noise rock and post hardcore album, and likely one of the most accessible in the noise rock genre for the uninitiated.
            Bitch Magnet have played a few reunion shows with other bands from the same indie scene and watching these guys play live brings the music to life in a whole other way from the studio recordings. Below I have embedded a video of them playing live in 2012 at the Knitting Factory.

Get The Album On Google Play

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Complete 3 Album Set On Amazon

Your Band Sucks by Jon Fine on Amazon (A Great Read)