de stijl

The White Stripes took their punk blues sound to the next level with this  stylish neo-plastic  jumble.  Jack Gillis and Meg White met as teenagers in Detroit, Michigan and, when they got married, Jack took his wife's surname.   After Jack played as a drummer in various local punk bands, Meg decided to start playing the drums and the couple became a band on their own.  They released their eponymous debut on the independent Sympathy for the Record Industry label in 1999.  Their second album 'De Stijl' was recorded at home on an 8-track analog tape with Jack White on guitar, piano, lead vocals, and double bass;   and  Meg White on drums, tambourine, backing vocals, shaker and floortom;    with  John Szymanski adding harmonica on "Hello Operator";  Paul Henry Ossy contributing violin on "I'm Bound to Pack It Up" and  electric violin on "Why Can't You Be Nicer to Me?";   and   Dominique Payette playing the world's smallest violin on " Jumble Jumble".  

The album takes its title from the Dutch art movement that is characterized by a reduction to the essentials of form and color.   Jack White reflects:   "We made a mistake with our second album, recording it in my living room. It's too distracting to be at home and do that kind of thing. You're better off when you're away from town, and you've got no choice but to get down to brass tacks...When I was a teenager and started apprenticing and working on furniture, I started really loving all these furniture designers, and I got into Gerrit Rietveld–he did "Red And Blue Chair," which is a super-important piece. That got me into the De Stijl movement. I thought that was great, how they broke things down to their simplest components...I like when people limit themselves. I love when artists do something with very little opportunity. I love forced creation. I used to own a record by William S. Burroughs, called Break Through In Grey Room. I always thought that was so great, just him in a room with a recording machine, cutting up the tape. I love that notion, anyone saying "I'm going to set up rules for myself and live by them." You find that in the great designers and the great architects and the great painters and the great songwriters, I think... It's appealing to know that people had standards. I think people are always attracted to that. If you were touring the house of some old famous person, and he never liked any lightbulbs in the house, and he only lit the house by candle... People are so enthused by that. "Oh, that's interesting that he had these rules." It makes you feel like this guy lived by certain notions that propelled him to be happy and to create. I like that idea. It at least symbolizes that that person is working toward something. When you see flagrant excess and rule-breaking and chaos in songwriting and art nowadays, you think that it's not really coming from anything, that they're just getting lucky."


'De Stijl' charted at one hundred and sixty-four in France, one hundred and thirty-seven in the UK, and thirty-eight on the US independent album chart.  




http://www.whitestripes.com

http://thirdmanrecords.com/about/artists/the-white-stripes





"You're Pretty Good Looking (For a Girl)"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkVjn-vKLQo




"Death Letter" 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obEFlt1ELD4




"Truth Doesn't Make a Noise"  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6_j8hDEaGs




"Jumble, Jumble"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnWm0q0auLk




"Your Southern Can Is Mine"  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fl1iSJg3WUQ






'De Stijl' 
full album:

https://myspace.com/msmhomelessartist49771412/music/album/de-stijl-20134382



All songs written by Jack White except where noted.

1. "You're Pretty Good Looking (For a Girl)"     1:49
2. "Hello Operator"     2:36
3. "Little Bird"     3:06
4. "Apple Blossom"     2:13
5. "I'm Bound to Pack It Up"     3:09
6. "Death Letter"   Eddie James "Son" House 4:29
7. "Sister, Do You Know My Name?"     2:52
8. "Truth Doesn't Make a Noise"     3:14
9. "A Boy's Best Friend"     4:22
10. "Let's Build a Home"     1:58
11. "Jumble, Jumble"     1:53
12. "Why Can't You Be Nicer to Me?"     3:22
13. "Your Southern Can Is Mine"   William Samuel "Blind Willie" McTell 2:29

elephant

The White Stripes served up some raw and ragged blackened blues and stampeded onto the world stage with the thunderous wail of this triumphant tour de force.  After the breakthrough success of 'White Blood Cells', Jack White and his ex-wife Meg went to Toe Rag Studios in London with engineer Liam Watson to record 'Elephant'.  White was drawn to the old equipment which included a duct-taped 8-track tape machine.  The sessions featured Jack White on lead vocals, guitar, keyboards, production, and mixing; Meg White on drums, backing vocals, lead vocals and organ on "In the Cold, Cold Night", co-lead vocals on "Well It's True That We Love One Another"; with Mort Crim doing the speech on "Little Acorns", and Holly Golightly performing co-lead vocals on "Well It's True That We Love One Another".  'Elephant' was dedicated to  "the death of the sweetheart".  White says:    "I really don't know, but that word and its connotations just appeal to me. I like the idea of the sweetheart and the gentleman.  It's just what those words mean to people. I like the notion of innocence. It's hard to remain innocent but ... Well, I don't swear in songs or anything like that so it's that idea, too...I like the idea of that, just opening yourself up to another way of thinking and another perspective."

'Elephant' stomped to number twenty-four in the Netherlands, twenty-one in France, seven in Sweden, six in New Zealand and the US, five in Canada, five in Australia, three in Ireland and Norway, and number one in the UK.  The album was nominated for a Grammy for Album of the Year and won for Best Alternative Music Album and Best Rock Song.  White considers:    "I'm in a two-piece band and I produce the albums. It's very easy to get my idea across."










www.whitestripes.com

https://thirdmanrecords.com/about/artists/the-white-stripes






"Seven Nation Army" hit number seventy-six on the US pop chart, forty-two in the Netherlands, twenty-two in Ireland, seventeen in Australia, seven in the UK, and number one on the US alternative chart.  It won a Grammy for Best Rock Song.  

I'm gonna fight 'em off A seven nation army couldn't hold me back 
They're gonna rip it off 
Taking their time right behind my back 
And I'm talking to myself at night 
Because I can't forget 
Back and forth through my mind 
Behind a cigarette 
And the message coming from my eyes 
It says leave it alone 
Don't want to hear about it 
Every single one's got a story to tell 
Everyone knows about it 
From the Queen of England to the hounds of hell 
And if I catch it coming back my way 
I'm gonna serve it to you 
And that ain't what you want to hear, 
But that's what I'll do 
And the feeling coming from my bones 
It says find a home 
I'm going to Wichita 
Far from this opera forever more 
I'm gonna work the straw, 
Make the sweat drip out of every pore 
And I'm pleading, and I'm pleading, 
And I'm pleading right before the Lord 
All the words are gonna bleed from me 
And I will think no more 
And the stains coming from my blood 
Tell me go back home

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0J2QdDbelmY






"I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself" went to twenty-five on the US alternative chart and thirteen in the UK. 







"Black Math" 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phcrV7LZ7GE





"In the Cold, Cold Night" 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIRLgdCn1v4



"I Want to Be the Boy to Warm Your Mother's Heart" 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52ZuIQTFD00





"Little Acorns" 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZrZZtxtQNo




"Hypnotize"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMDgHDC1ZMU




"Well It's True That We Love One Another" 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEDr7Gtd_hE







'Elephant' 
full album:



All tracks written by Jack White, except where noted.


1. "Seven Nation Army" 3:52
2. "Black Math" 3:04
3. "There's No Home for You Here" 3:44
4. "I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself" (Burt Bacharach, Hal David) 2:46
5. "In the Cold, Cold Night" 2:58
6. "I Want to Be the Boy to Warm Your Mother's Heart" 3:21
7. "You've Got Her in Your Pocket" 3:40
8. "Ball and Biscuit" 7:19
9. "The Hardest Button to Button" 3:32
10. "Little Acorns" (White, Mort Crim) 4:09
11. "Hypnotize" 1:48
12. "The Air Near My Fingers" 3:40
13. "Girl, You Have No Faith in Medicine" 3:18
14. "Well It's True That We Love One Another" 2:43


bonus tracks
15. "Who's to Say" (Dan John Miller) 4:36
16. "Good to Me" (Brendan Benson) 2:07

white blood cells

The White Stripes busted out of the Detroit underground and into the spotlight with their third album of bluesy garage rock. Husband and wife duo Jack and Meg White smash through sixteen songs about fame, fear, love, and betrayal with straightforward vigor that injects raw power into the blues. It was recorded in less than four days in Memphis, Tennessee after a week of rehearsals. Jack White wanted a rushed lo-fi feel to the record: "It was cool because a lot of things had been sitting around for a long time, stuff I had written on piano that had been just sitting around not doing anything. And it was good to put them all together at once, put them all in the same box and see what happened."




Originally released on the independent Sympathy for the Record Industry label, 'White Blood Cells' sold so well that it was rereleased on Universal subsidiary V2 Records a year later. Ironically, the album deals with the trappings of fame. Jack muses: "When does music become a business and why do we have to be suckered into it? Why do we have to buy a cell phone, you know what I mean? A lot of that stuff upsets me. It gets annoying. The name, 'White Blood Cells', for the album, is this idea of bacteria coming at us, or just foreign things coming at us, or media, or attention on the band. It just seems to us that there are so many bands from the same time or before we started that were playing and are still playing that didn’t get this kind of attention that we’re getting. Is the attention good or bad? When you open the CD, it’s a picture of us with these cameras. Wondering if it’s good or bad."

http://www.whitestripes.com/



http://www.whitestripes.net/


https://thirdmanrecords.com/about/artists/the-white-stripes

'Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground' kicks things off with vigor.

"Dead leaves and the dirty ground

When I know you're not around

Shiny tops and soda pops

When I hear your lips make a sound

Thirty notes in the mailbox

Will tell you that I'm coming home

And I think I'm gonna stick around

For a while so you're not alone"

The sweet country stomp of 'Hotel Yorba' was inspired by "a really disgusting hotel."

"It might sound silly

for me to think childish thoughts like these

but i'm so tired of acting tough

and i'm gonna do what i please

lets get married

in a big cathedral by a priest

cause if i'm the man that you love the most

you could say i do at least"

The lego stop action video for 'Fell In Love With A Girl' was directed by Michel Gondry.

"Fell in love with a girl

Fell in love once and almost completely

She's in love with the world

But sometimes these feelings can be so misleading

She turns and says are you alright?

I said I must be fine, 'cause my heart's still beating

She says, come and kiss me by the riverside

Bobby says it's fine, he don't consider it cheating now."

The graceful acoustic ditty 'We're Going To Be Friends' hints of primary school romance.

"Walk with me, Susie Lee

Through the park and by the tree

We will rest upon the ground

And look at all the bugs we found

Safely walk to school without a sound"

'White Blood Cells' 
full album:




All songs written and composed by Jack White. 

No. Title Length
1. "Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground"   3:04
2. "Hotel Yorba"   2:10
3. "I'm Finding It Harder to Be a Gentleman"   2:54
4. "Fell in Love with a Girl"   1:50
5. "Expecting"   2:03
6. "Little Room"   0:50
7. "The Union Forever"   3:26
8. "The Same Boy You've Always Known"   3:09
9. "We're Going to Be Friends"   2:22
10. "Offend in Every Way"   3:06
11. "I Think I Smell a Rat"   2:04
12. "Aluminum"   2:19
13. "I Can't Wait"   3:38
14. "Now Mary"   1:47
15. "I Can Learn"   3:31

16. "This Protector"   2:12