| Jack White — Boarding House Reach (March 23, 2018) |
Jack White — Boarding House Reach (March 23, 2018)
•γ• Rozpačité, nerovnoměrné a někdy nevyzpytatelné. Naprostá hloupost alba je veskrze však přesto zábavná. Je to tak radikální, experimentální a myšlenkově expanzivní popové album, jaké pravděpodobně nebudete mít šanci slyšet v nejbližších desíti měsících. Apropo, Jack je ale pořád vítězem čtyř cen: Satellite Awards 2008 za “Another Way To Die” (Jack White and Alicia Keys)/Best Original Song. Dále: O Music Awards 2013/Analog Genius Award. No a 2x Grammy: 2015 “Lazaretto”/Best Rock Performance a 2015 The Rise & Fall Of Paramount Records, Volume One (1917–27)/Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package. Rock & roll auteur at the helm of the White Stripes, the Raconteurs, Dead Weather, and Third Man Records, plus production work and solo albums. Birth name: John Anthony Gillis
•γ• Jack White will celebrate the release of his new album BOARDING HOUSE REACH with three intimate performances in Los Angeles, Brooklyn, and London. These will be the first shows featuring new songs from BOARDING HOUSE REACH, outside of two “Live First Listen” previews held at White’s own Third Man Records in Nashville this week, and will feature White’s new touring outfit: Carla Azar on drums, Quincy McCrary and Neal Evans on keys, and Dominic Davis on bass guitar. Show times, ticket availabilities, and pre~sales vary from event to event, but each present a rare opportunity for audiences to be among the first to acquaint themselves with White’s new material from BOARDING HOUSE REACH as well as reimagined songs from his catalog.
Born: July 9, 1975 in Detroit, Michigan
Instruments: Vocals guitar drums keyboards mandolin bass guitar marimba
Notable instruments:
•γ• 1965 JB Hutto Montgomery Airline
•γ• 1970s~era Crestwood Astral II
•γ• Gretsch Penguin
•γ• 1950s~era Kay Hollowbody
•γ• Custom Gretsch Triple Jet
•γ• Custom Gretsch Jupiter Thunderbird
•γ• Custom Gretsch Anniversary Jr. “Green Machine”
•γ• Ludwig Drums
•γ• Fender Highway One Telecaster
Location: Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Genre: Blues Rock
Album release: March 23, 2018
Studio: Third Man Studio, Nashville, Tennessee Sear Sound, New York City Capitol Studios, Los Angeles
Record Label: Third Man Columbia XL
Duration: 44:14
Tracks:
01. Connected by Love 4:38
02. Why Walk a Dog? 2:30
03. Corporation 5:39
04. Abulia and Akrasia 1:28
05. Hypermisophoniac 3:35
06. Ice Station Zebra 3:59
07. Over and Over and Over 3:36
08. Everything You’ve Ever Learned 2:14
09. Respect Commander 4:34
10. Ezmerelda Steals the Show 1:43
11. Get in the Mind Shaft 4:13
12. What’s Done Is Done 2:55
13. Humoresque 3:10
This is the current touring line~up in support of Boarding House Reach:
•γ• Carla Azar — drums
•γ• Dominic Davis — bass
•γ• Neal Evans — synthesizer, organ
•γ• Quincy McCrary — keyboards
Primary artist:
• Jack White — vocals, writing, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, drums, organ, synthesizer
Session musicians:
• Bobby Allende — percussion
• Carla Azar — drums
• Anthony Brewster — synthesizer
• Louis Cato — drums
• Neal Evans — keyboards
• DJ Harrison — synthesizer
• Daru Jones — drums
• Charlotte Kemp Muhl — bass
• Ann McCrary — backing vocals
• Quincy McCrary — keyboards
• Regina McCrary — backing vocals
• Gianluca Braccio Montone — piano
• Ian Montone — piano
• NeonPhoenix — bass
• Justin Porée — percussion
• Esther Rose — backing vocals
• C. W. Stoneking — vocals (track 4)
Technical personnel:
•γ• Chandler Harrod — assistant engineer
•γ• Bob Ludwig — mastering engineer
•γ• Todd Manfalcone — engineering
•γ• Vance Powell — recording engineer
•γ• Ben Schmitz — assistant engineer
•γ• Bill Skibbe — mixing, recording engineer
•γ• Joshua V. Smith — assistant engineer, mixing
•γ• Grant Valentine — assistant engineer
•γ• Jack White — production, engineering, mixing
Studio albums:
•γ• Blunderbuss (2012)
•γ• Lazaretto (2014)
•γ• Boarding House Reach (2018)
Compilation albums:
•γ• Acoustic Recordings 1998~2016 (2016)
Review
Written By Hal Horowitz // March 15, 2018 // Score: 4,5 from 5
•γ• “Hello, welcome to everything you’ve ever learned,” sings Jack White on his first new album in nearly four years. And he’s not kidding. Listening to it is like watching a twisty, multi~part Netflix series; you don’t know where it’s going but you’re transfixed nonetheless.
•γ• Of course, the eclectic, unpredictable White has typically eluded artistic roadmaps. Still, the abrupt, often startling changes in direction on this 13~track opus will give White’s most ardent fans a thrill ride and whiplash those less attuned to his whims.
•γ• From the opening throbbing synth bass lines of the bluesy, widescreen single “Connected By Love,” to the Zeppelin guitar riff that’s here then gone, supported by a drum loop on the gonzo “Respect Commander,” the spoken~word electro~funk of “Get In The Mind Shaft,” and the country duet ballad “What’s Done is Done,” White revels in avoiding expectations. And that’s before the melancholy, stripped~down (piano, muted bass, acoustic guitar and brushed drums) closer “Humoresque” that White heard through a musical manuscript from Al Capone. About the only thread connecting these tunes is his voice, and even that shapeshifts as it hopscotches between selections.
•γ• The temptation is to accuse White of throwing everything — including jazz/hip~hop/funk on “Ice Station Zebra” — at the wall to see what sticks. But he’s too smart, interesting, curious and compelling of an artist to be dismissed with that cliché. Rather, songs such as the head~spinning “Hypermisophoniac” (as crazed and obtuse as its title which may have something to do with “robbing a bank”) grab your ears and won’t let go. When he rocks out with White Stripes abandon on the aggressive riff~driven “Over And Over Again,” Zappa~styled backing vocals with percolating percussion take us someplace we aren’t expecting.
•γ• In many ways, this is as radical, experimental and mind~expanding of a pop album as you’re likely to hear anytime soon, let alone by a festival headlining artist.
•γ• “Who’s with me?” he asks on “Corporation.”
•γ• We are. •γ• https://americansongwriter.com/
•γ• “I love the Jack Casady because it gives you that quick decay that an upright has. I have a lot of hollowbody basses, but most of them are short scale like a Hofner. The Jack Casady plays like one of those, but stays in tune and feels like all of my other regular scale basses. Plus, it’s versatile. My other hollowbody basses sound great, but they only have one sound. The Jack Casady really gives you a lot to work with. I highly recommend it with flat wounds.” (Dominic Davis)
Review
By Alex Hudson, Published Mar 16, 2018 / Score: 7
•γ• Jack White has always written weird songs, but before now, his preference for traditional rock and folk instrumentation has meant that he’s usually seen as a retro classicist. On Boarding House Reach, however, White is finally letting his freak flag fly.
•γ• Not only are these the strangest songs White has ever written, he’s now got the eclectic instrumentation to match. These 13 tracks feature a synth~heavy sonic palette and freewheeling structures that White stitched together from extended studio jams, resulting in a postmodern mashup of vintage and futuristic. There are Blade Runner keyboards on “Get in the Mind Shaft,” clavinet~driven funk on “Corporation,” and adrenaline~fuelled rock riffing on “Over and Over and Over.”
•γ• There’s even full~blown hip~hop on “Ice Station Zebra.” White isn’t exactly a great rapper — his flow is more or less identical to “Parents Just Don’t Understand” — but the song is an enjoyably daring romp.
•γ• Boarding House Reach is a flawed record. Theatrical electro~soul single “Connected by Love” is the most traditionally structured song here, but it’s oddly tuneless, while the spaghetti western spoken word of “Abulia and Akrasia” doesn’t quite gel with the synth~rock direction of the rest of the album.
•γ• Still, even when an experiment fails, it does so in intriguing and unpredictable ways. Given that White is a generation~defining musician 20 years into his career — and particularly considering the staunch minimalism he used to be known for — it’s exciting to hear him indulge in a creative free~for~all. •γ• https://exclaim.ca/
Review
BY JEREMY WINOGRAD, MARCH 13, 2018 / SCORE: ***
•γ• As critically venerated a figure as Jack White is in the landscape of modern rock, it’s been a surprisingly long time since his music has generated as much public interest as his tireless self~promotional efforts as a specialty vinyl huckster, record~label mogul, and ranting Luddite. But even as White continues to set the industry abuzz without having to pick up a guitar — his recent decision to ban cellphones on his upcoming tour has predictably rankled many and overjoyed others — his third solo album, Boarding House Reach, is his first to play like a major career statement. A postmodern assault of freaked~out sonic ataxia, it’s messy, wildly uneven, and at times even close to unlistenable, but its sheer audacity makes it utterly intriguing.
•γ• In the traditional verse~chorus sense, there are very few actual songs on Boarding House Reach. And the few that could be categorized as such rank among the weakest of White’s career, including the lumbering, hookless opener and lead single, “Connected By Love,” a schlocky gospel~rock pastiche that finds White falling prey to the all~too~common blue~eyed soulmeister delusion that voice cracks and singing out of tune constitute emoting. The track’s un~catchy melody lazily recurs on the nondescript country waltz “What’s Done Is Done,” while a similarly overzealous backing vocal style shows up on the fuzzed~up rocker “Over and Over and Over,” a song White originally wrote in the mid~2000s and has attempted to record multiple times since.
•γ• Almost everything else on Boarding House Reach blurs together into a trippy, disorienting futuristic soundscape. There are plenty of recognizable genre signifiers heard throughout — funky clavinet, hip~hop drums, White’s own piercing guitar pyrotechnics — but they’re all blended together in an almost alien fashion. Given its scarcity of melodic hooks, not to mention actual singing, the album derives excitement from its jagged grooves and constantly mutating electronic flourishes. (The creative editing that made these sonic collages feasible was facilitated by White’s first~ever dalliance with Pro Tools — once a blasphemous proposition for a notorious analog fetishist.)
•γ• Messy, uneven, and at times unlistenable, the album’s sheer audacity makes it utterly intriguing.
•γ• If the combination of bleating robot noises and atonal free~jazz piano that constitutes “Hypermisophoniac” was intended to induce the title condition, well, the track is a ringing success. And White’s stabs at anti~corporate subversion, heard on the game~show music/punk hybrid “Everything You’ve Ever Learned” and, unsurprisingly, “Corporation,” are a little hard to take seriously considering that he himself is the face of a company, Third Man Records, that relentlessly hawks overpriced novelty swag like baseball jerseys.
•γ• When everything clicks, though, Boarding House Reach can be infectious. The giddy funk groove of “Corporation” is energetic, while the lush synths and vocoder vocals of “Get in the Mind Shaft” produce an entrancing futurism, like something out of a dream. And even as White hops between ostensibly familiar genres, from the type of swaggering blues~rock workout he’s known for (“Respect Commander”), to a daring foray into old~school hip~hop (“Ice Station Zebra”), none of it sounds quite like what you’d expect. On the former, his crunchy riffing speeds up and slows down, disappears and then takes over again, punctuated by whirring electronics, as he shrieks about his femdom fantasies. It’s hardly “Ball and Biscuit” all over again, to say the least.
•γ• Divorced from full~album context, any of these songs might appear incomprehensible. But taken together as an immersive soundscape occasionally interrupted by disjointed experiments and formulaic rock songs, they begin to make sense. And perhaps best moment comes when White decides to turn even that blueprint on its head. The final track, “Humoresque,” is a rendition of a famous 1890s Dvořák piece with lyrics by Howard Johnson, as recollected on a manuscript written by Al Capone in prison that White purchased at auction. If that backstory isn’t interesting enough, White’s rendition undoubtedly is. The gentle soft~hoe style, the swooningly romantic lyrics, and White’s sweetly tender singing are all completely unlike anything else in his catalogue. As Boarding House Reach proves, that’s certainly no guarantor of quality, but at least it means the album is never boring. •γ• https://www.slantmagazine.com/
Label: https://thirdmanrecords.com/
Website Carla Azar: http://www.autolux.net/
Website Jack White: http://jackwhiteiii.com/
Interview with Carla Azar Interview by Jack White & Mindy Abovitz: http://tomtommag.com/2013/01/jack-white-interviews-carla-azar/
_____________________________________________________________
| Jack White — Boarding House Reach (March 23, 2018) |
•γ• Jack White will celebrate the release of his new album BOARDING HOUSE REACH with three intimate performances in Los Angeles, Brooklyn, and London. These will be the first shows featuring new songs from BOARDING HOUSE REACH, outside of two “Live First Listen” previews held at White’s own Third Man Records in Nashville this week, and will feature White’s new touring outfit: Carla Azar on drums, Quincy McCrary and Neal Evans on keys, and Dominic Davis on bass guitar. Show times, ticket availabilities, and pre~sales vary from event to event, but each present a rare opportunity for audiences to be among the first to acquaint themselves with White’s new material from BOARDING HOUSE REACH as well as reimagined songs from his catalog.
Instruments: Vocals guitar drums keyboards mandolin bass guitar marimba
Notable instruments:
•γ• 1965 JB Hutto Montgomery Airline
•γ• 1970s~era Crestwood Astral II
•γ• Gretsch Penguin
•γ• 1950s~era Kay Hollowbody
•γ• Custom Gretsch Triple Jet
•γ• Custom Gretsch Jupiter Thunderbird
•γ• Custom Gretsch Anniversary Jr. “Green Machine”
•γ• Ludwig Drums
•γ• Fender Highway One Telecaster
Location: Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Genre: Blues Rock
Album release: March 23, 2018
Studio: Third Man Studio, Nashville, Tennessee Sear Sound, New York City Capitol Studios, Los Angeles
Record Label: Third Man Columbia XL
Duration: 44:14
Tracks:
01. Connected by Love 4:38
02. Why Walk a Dog? 2:30
03. Corporation 5:39
04. Abulia and Akrasia 1:28
05. Hypermisophoniac 3:35
06. Ice Station Zebra 3:59
07. Over and Over and Over 3:36
08. Everything You’ve Ever Learned 2:14
09. Respect Commander 4:34
10. Ezmerelda Steals the Show 1:43
11. Get in the Mind Shaft 4:13
12. What’s Done Is Done 2:55
13. Humoresque 3:10
This is the current touring line~up in support of Boarding House Reach:
•γ• Carla Azar — drums
•γ• Dominic Davis — bass
•γ• Neal Evans — synthesizer, organ
•γ• Quincy McCrary — keyboards
Primary artist:
• Jack White — vocals, writing, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, drums, organ, synthesizer
Session musicians:
• Bobby Allende — percussion
• Carla Azar — drums
• Anthony Brewster — synthesizer
• Louis Cato — drums
• Neal Evans — keyboards
• DJ Harrison — synthesizer
• Daru Jones — drums
• Charlotte Kemp Muhl — bass
• Ann McCrary — backing vocals
• Quincy McCrary — keyboards
• Regina McCrary — backing vocals
• Gianluca Braccio Montone — piano
• Ian Montone — piano
• NeonPhoenix — bass
• Justin Porée — percussion
• Esther Rose — backing vocals
• C. W. Stoneking — vocals (track 4)
Technical personnel:
•γ• Chandler Harrod — assistant engineer
•γ• Bob Ludwig — mastering engineer
•γ• Todd Manfalcone — engineering
•γ• Vance Powell — recording engineer
•γ• Ben Schmitz — assistant engineer
•γ• Bill Skibbe — mixing, recording engineer
•γ• Joshua V. Smith — assistant engineer, mixing
•γ• Grant Valentine — assistant engineer
•γ• Jack White — production, engineering, mixing
Studio albums:
•γ• Blunderbuss (2012)
•γ• Lazaretto (2014)
•γ• Boarding House Reach (2018)
Compilation albums:
•γ• Acoustic Recordings 1998~2016 (2016)
Review
Written By Hal Horowitz // March 15, 2018 // Score: 4,5 from 5
•γ• “Hello, welcome to everything you’ve ever learned,” sings Jack White on his first new album in nearly four years. And he’s not kidding. Listening to it is like watching a twisty, multi~part Netflix series; you don’t know where it’s going but you’re transfixed nonetheless.
•γ• Of course, the eclectic, unpredictable White has typically eluded artistic roadmaps. Still, the abrupt, often startling changes in direction on this 13~track opus will give White’s most ardent fans a thrill ride and whiplash those less attuned to his whims.
•γ• From the opening throbbing synth bass lines of the bluesy, widescreen single “Connected By Love,” to the Zeppelin guitar riff that’s here then gone, supported by a drum loop on the gonzo “Respect Commander,” the spoken~word electro~funk of “Get In The Mind Shaft,” and the country duet ballad “What’s Done is Done,” White revels in avoiding expectations. And that’s before the melancholy, stripped~down (piano, muted bass, acoustic guitar and brushed drums) closer “Humoresque” that White heard through a musical manuscript from Al Capone. About the only thread connecting these tunes is his voice, and even that shapeshifts as it hopscotches between selections.
•γ• The temptation is to accuse White of throwing everything — including jazz/hip~hop/funk on “Ice Station Zebra” — at the wall to see what sticks. But he’s too smart, interesting, curious and compelling of an artist to be dismissed with that cliché. Rather, songs such as the head~spinning “Hypermisophoniac” (as crazed and obtuse as its title which may have something to do with “robbing a bank”) grab your ears and won’t let go. When he rocks out with White Stripes abandon on the aggressive riff~driven “Over And Over Again,” Zappa~styled backing vocals with percolating percussion take us someplace we aren’t expecting.
•γ• In many ways, this is as radical, experimental and mind~expanding of a pop album as you’re likely to hear anytime soon, let alone by a festival headlining artist.
•γ• “Who’s with me?” he asks on “Corporation.”
•γ• We are. •γ• https://americansongwriter.com/
By Alex Hudson, Published Mar 16, 2018 / Score: 7
•γ• Jack White has always written weird songs, but before now, his preference for traditional rock and folk instrumentation has meant that he’s usually seen as a retro classicist. On Boarding House Reach, however, White is finally letting his freak flag fly.
•γ• Not only are these the strangest songs White has ever written, he’s now got the eclectic instrumentation to match. These 13 tracks feature a synth~heavy sonic palette and freewheeling structures that White stitched together from extended studio jams, resulting in a postmodern mashup of vintage and futuristic. There are Blade Runner keyboards on “Get in the Mind Shaft,” clavinet~driven funk on “Corporation,” and adrenaline~fuelled rock riffing on “Over and Over and Over.”
•γ• There’s even full~blown hip~hop on “Ice Station Zebra.” White isn’t exactly a great rapper — his flow is more or less identical to “Parents Just Don’t Understand” — but the song is an enjoyably daring romp.
•γ• Boarding House Reach is a flawed record. Theatrical electro~soul single “Connected by Love” is the most traditionally structured song here, but it’s oddly tuneless, while the spaghetti western spoken word of “Abulia and Akrasia” doesn’t quite gel with the synth~rock direction of the rest of the album.
•γ• Still, even when an experiment fails, it does so in intriguing and unpredictable ways. Given that White is a generation~defining musician 20 years into his career — and particularly considering the staunch minimalism he used to be known for — it’s exciting to hear him indulge in a creative free~for~all. •γ• https://exclaim.ca/
Review
BY JEREMY WINOGRAD, MARCH 13, 2018 / SCORE: ***
•γ• As critically venerated a figure as Jack White is in the landscape of modern rock, it’s been a surprisingly long time since his music has generated as much public interest as his tireless self~promotional efforts as a specialty vinyl huckster, record~label mogul, and ranting Luddite. But even as White continues to set the industry abuzz without having to pick up a guitar — his recent decision to ban cellphones on his upcoming tour has predictably rankled many and overjoyed others — his third solo album, Boarding House Reach, is his first to play like a major career statement. A postmodern assault of freaked~out sonic ataxia, it’s messy, wildly uneven, and at times even close to unlistenable, but its sheer audacity makes it utterly intriguing.
•γ• In the traditional verse~chorus sense, there are very few actual songs on Boarding House Reach. And the few that could be categorized as such rank among the weakest of White’s career, including the lumbering, hookless opener and lead single, “Connected By Love,” a schlocky gospel~rock pastiche that finds White falling prey to the all~too~common blue~eyed soulmeister delusion that voice cracks and singing out of tune constitute emoting. The track’s un~catchy melody lazily recurs on the nondescript country waltz “What’s Done Is Done,” while a similarly overzealous backing vocal style shows up on the fuzzed~up rocker “Over and Over and Over,” a song White originally wrote in the mid~2000s and has attempted to record multiple times since.
•γ• Almost everything else on Boarding House Reach blurs together into a trippy, disorienting futuristic soundscape. There are plenty of recognizable genre signifiers heard throughout — funky clavinet, hip~hop drums, White’s own piercing guitar pyrotechnics — but they’re all blended together in an almost alien fashion. Given its scarcity of melodic hooks, not to mention actual singing, the album derives excitement from its jagged grooves and constantly mutating electronic flourishes. (The creative editing that made these sonic collages feasible was facilitated by White’s first~ever dalliance with Pro Tools — once a blasphemous proposition for a notorious analog fetishist.)
•γ• Messy, uneven, and at times unlistenable, the album’s sheer audacity makes it utterly intriguing.
•γ• If the combination of bleating robot noises and atonal free~jazz piano that constitutes “Hypermisophoniac” was intended to induce the title condition, well, the track is a ringing success. And White’s stabs at anti~corporate subversion, heard on the game~show music/punk hybrid “Everything You’ve Ever Learned” and, unsurprisingly, “Corporation,” are a little hard to take seriously considering that he himself is the face of a company, Third Man Records, that relentlessly hawks overpriced novelty swag like baseball jerseys.
•γ• When everything clicks, though, Boarding House Reach can be infectious. The giddy funk groove of “Corporation” is energetic, while the lush synths and vocoder vocals of “Get in the Mind Shaft” produce an entrancing futurism, like something out of a dream. And even as White hops between ostensibly familiar genres, from the type of swaggering blues~rock workout he’s known for (“Respect Commander”), to a daring foray into old~school hip~hop (“Ice Station Zebra”), none of it sounds quite like what you’d expect. On the former, his crunchy riffing speeds up and slows down, disappears and then takes over again, punctuated by whirring electronics, as he shrieks about his femdom fantasies. It’s hardly “Ball and Biscuit” all over again, to say the least.
•γ• Divorced from full~album context, any of these songs might appear incomprehensible. But taken together as an immersive soundscape occasionally interrupted by disjointed experiments and formulaic rock songs, they begin to make sense. And perhaps best moment comes when White decides to turn even that blueprint on its head. The final track, “Humoresque,” is a rendition of a famous 1890s Dvořák piece with lyrics by Howard Johnson, as recollected on a manuscript written by Al Capone in prison that White purchased at auction. If that backstory isn’t interesting enough, White’s rendition undoubtedly is. The gentle soft~hoe style, the swooningly romantic lyrics, and White’s sweetly tender singing are all completely unlike anything else in his catalogue. As Boarding House Reach proves, that’s certainly no guarantor of quality, but at least it means the album is never boring. •γ• https://www.slantmagazine.com/
Label: https://thirdmanrecords.com/
Website Carla Azar: http://www.autolux.net/
Website Jack White: http://jackwhiteiii.com/
Interview with Carla Azar Interview by Jack White & Mindy Abovitz: http://tomtommag.com/2013/01/jack-white-interviews-carla-azar/