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Jack White: Blunderbuss

Blunderbuss
Our Rating
4 Stars - Excellent
Average Rating
 
(5 user ratings) ADD YOURS Help
Artist
Release
April 24, 2012
Label
Third Man Records / Columbia

Style: Alternative rock; compare to White Stripes, The Raconteurs

Top tracks: "I'm Shakin'," "Sixteen Saltines," "Blunderbuss"

While ear-twisting six-string tones and riffs make appearances, Blunderbuss isn't a "Jack White guitar album" by any stretch. Instead his solo debut is powered by atypical instrumentation, most notably from the keyboard family—but the cool cousins (e.g., Rhodes, slightly out-of-tune piano). The album casts a few more shadows than light thanks to some violent lyrical jaunts ("Love Interruption," "Freedom at 21," "Trash Tongue Talker"), but there's whimsy, too. The best is "I'm Shakin'," a 1960s doo-wop ditty that White reignites with a spare, guttural groove augmenting witty Samson and Delilah lyrical references. But don't get too excited: In the blistering "Sixteen Saltines," White insists that "the Lord's joke is a boat in a sea of sadness."


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Comments

Mark Murphy

April 28, 2012  4:40pm

To re-use an old trope I read posted a while back: 'This is edifying how?'

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Robert Armstrong

April 24, 2012  10:49am

I'm sure Jack and the other artists reviewed today are wonderful musicians and good at what they do. Were there any Christian releases this week? Am I going to find the Christian reviews in Rolling Stone Magazine? The reason I ask is that it seems their reviews have somehow ended up in Christianity Today. I'm not trying to be closed minded as some people will accuse me of, but I really would like to read Christian reviews in a Christian publication.

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