What was not stressful was having this next album in the car the last two days It even had something in common with my previously reviewed Loreena McKennitt album - that one featured a harp made out of someone's bones - in this record they build a whole house out of bones.
Disc 263 is...Horehound
Artist: The Dead Weather
What’s Up With The Cover?: I believe this is a photo of singer Alison Mosshart looking mysterious in some kind of darkened briar patch. It is a very dark and evocative cover, that suits the music well. I approve!
How I Came To Know It: This band was recommended to me by our friends Sherylyn and Joel as another successful Jack White spinoff. Well done, Sherylyn and Joel.
How It Stacks Up: The Dead Weather only have two albums, and I only have this one. I like this one, and will likely pick up their 2010 release, "Sea of Cowards" at some point down the road.
Rating: 4 stars.
The Dead Weather is one of those supergroups composed of various band members from other successful projects. This has been a fairly common phenomenon in the last few years, and it can turn out very well (like "Them Crooked Vultures") or come off overblown and busy (like "Queens of the Stone Age"). Since The Dead Weather actually features a guy from Queens of the Stone Age, I was a little trepidatious.
Turns out, I had no reason to be. This is a rock record made by people who know what they're doing, and if it is a little overblown, that only adds to its charm. The music is principally a combination of Jack White's riff-driven guitar sound that he did so successfully with the White Stripes and Raconteurs, and Alison Mosshart's lascivious bluesy voice. It is a match made in heaven - making me wonder what took so long?
Apparently Mosshart was in some other band called "The Kills" which I may just have to check out. I love digging backward through musical history (I dig forward naturally just by staying alive year after year).
While I wouldn't call this record a 5 star masterpiece, there aren't any duds, and there are more than a few gems. I particularly like "Hang You From the Heavens" and "Treat Me Like Your Mother" both of which capture the tortured relationships so common to blues music, and then turn the volume to 11.
In particular, "Treat Me Like Your Mother" cranks it up another notch for the twenty-first century. The song focuses around a woman scolding her man for coming home late, with bad excuses on his lips. As the protagonists sings:
C'mon look me in the eye
You want to try to tell a lie?
I bet you can't an dyou know why?
I'm just like your mother.
The song takes the Oedipal complex to a whole other level. I imagine this Oedipus as a drunken lout coming home to a veritable harridan in a dirty shift and a foul temper - as ready to slap him happy as talk to him.
There aren't any kings involved, and no one gets their eyes stabbed out (at least not in the part of the narrative covered by the song) but the song is just as tragic. In Oedipus Rex, Oedipus treats his mother as his wife. In "Treat Me Like Your Mother" the character marries a woman who acts like his mother. Then she goes one step creepier, and demands he acknowledge it's true.
Of course, none of this would be possible, without the angry vocal delivery of Mosshart, who stands tallest among the musical giants that make up The Dead Weather.
This album is very new to me, and I'm still discovering its various nuances. I recently commented that it was a bit pretentious (to the above-noted Joel and Sherylyn), but I wholeheartedly retract that statement after my most recent two listens (I've probably listened to it straight through about eight times total to date).
Yes, The Dead Weather ranges all over, and isn't afraid to take chances, but at its core, it is a truthful and honest record made by musicians who clearly care about both the craft, and the history of the music that has come before them.
I think the challenge it faced is that I've mostly played it at low to moderate volumes. This is an angry rock record that is best heard loud. In my car, this was entirely possible, and the results were revelatory. It is designed to be loud, and you can see why once you turn it up.
If you are looking for a carbon copy of the White Stripes this isn't for you. But if you're looking for a whole other direction of Jack White's genius, then climb aboard. This record cuts like a buffalo.
Best tracks: Hang You From the Heavens, I Cut Like a Buffalo, Treat Me Like Your Mother, Bone House,
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