"They wrote the songs to fill in the gaps between being some place and getting there"

Look out kids, The White Stripes are back with barely a guitar in sight.

Lead track "Blue Orchid" with it's mincing disco-rock-high-pitched energy sounds like Jack White's other stab at dance floor rock (Electric Six's "Danger High Voltage") - and this song is one of the few songs that will have fans of the OLD White Stripes sound coming back for more. For, and let me make this perfectly clear, Jack White has either a lot of courage or a really large don't give a fk attitude.

Let's run through a few examples shall we? "Little Ghost" is a beautiful little bluegrass rave-up similar to what the Be Good Tanyas excell at. "My Doorbell" (with only drums, piano and tambourine) sounds like an old Jackson Five number sung by a dirty old man (although thinking about Michael now...). "The Nurse" veers between spidery marimba and stabs of heavy metal guitar nonsense. "I'm Lonely (But I Ain't That Lonely Yet)" sounds like it belongs on an old Crosby Stills Nash and Young album. And "Instinct Blues" sounds like nothing other than Led Zeppelin in their prime! No word of a lie...

"Evil can be funny. Righteousness is a barrel of laughs too."

Everywhere you turn there's a new White Stripes sound (and heavily acoustic for the most part) - and after 4 solid albums of the same song (albiet a hell of a good one) it's all a bit too much to take in straight away. And this is the album's real power - yes it is covered in great songs, and it'll be the album I come back to over any of their others in years to come - but the ability of it to thumb it's nose and raise it's middle finger to everyone but themselves is an increasingly rarely heard sound in these glorious days of pepsi endorsements.

Or: if you're one of their fans who loved them for refusing to play bass guitar on record - ONLY guitar and drums - it may be best you steer clear (and get on with your life!)

Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Blue Orchid
2. The Nurse
3. My Doorbell
4. Forever For Her (Is Ovber For Me)
5. Little Ghost
6. The Denial Twist
7. White Moon
8. Instinct Blues
9. Passive Manipulation
10. Take, Take, Take
11. As Ugly As I Am
12. Red Rain
13. I'm Lonely (But I Ain't That Lonely Yet)