WITH THE GHOST OF OLD TOM JOAD!

I was twelve years old, experiencing a musical coming of age.  At twelve, I was reaching the age where the music I listened to was not just whatever played on the radio, or what my parents listened to; I was now making intentional choices about the sounds I wanted to hear.  The world of music fascinated me, and as a budding guitarist, I began to study musicians; their techniques and their styles (usually without being able to duplicate them).  The easiest way to do this was to watch live performances, and the music channel was a gold mine of such recordings.  From age twelve to thirteen, concerts were pretty much all I watched by myself.  One day I was watching the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 25th anniversary concert, and given that it featured such acts as Jeff Beck, Paul Simon, and Bruce Springsteen, the rest of my family was interested.

The acts went by, and after maybe an hour (forgive my lapse in memory, It’s been a while) Bruce Springsteen came onstage.  He played for a very long time.  I’m talking extremely long.  So long, I had even begun to lose interest.  Then, the Boss began to speak again; “I want to bring out one of the greatest guitar players in rock and roll, and a great voice from Rage Against the Machine and The Night Watchman…Tom Morello.

They began playing a song that, for the most part sounded like a Bruce Springsteen song, nothing more, nothing less.  Bruce stiffened up and belted out the first verse.

Man walks along the railroad track
He’s goin’ some place, there’s no turnin’ back
The Highway Patrol chopper comin’ up over the ridge
Man sleeps by a campfire under the bridge

After the first verse, Tom stepped up to the mic and began singing the second.  I was surprised at how unorthodox his voice was.  He followed pitch loosely and trailed off with the last word of each line; and yet, it was just what the song needed.  They led into a solo, where Bruce seemed to tighten every muscle in his body, and Tom Morello did some weird stuff (as he does) that I knew enough about him to expect.  The performance was entertaining, but it became mind-blowing when Tom Morello began his second solo.

The last shall be first and the first shall be last

Armed with an array of space age effects Morello launched into a 10 note ascending and descending scale, which is about as close to the melody as he stuck for the rest of the ordeal.   Then, for about fifteen seconds, he played the same note, over and over… It gets crazier.  Morello now does something that I cannot accurately describe; flipping his pointer finger above and below the neck of the guitar hammering certain notes.  This led into a delayed series of scales each going up a half step, but echoing throughout creating a discordant web of noise before finally doing his impression of a hip-hop turntable to top it off.  Like Morello himself with his high strapped guitar, and untrimmed guitar strings, this solo was the perfect unorthodox addition to this rousing folk ballad.

I won’t say this performance changed my life, but I did try for about a week to learn how to make record scratching sounds with my guitar, before finally giving up and citing the reason for doing so as the simple fact the I am not Tom Morello.  It also sent me into a bit of an obsession with Morello that has since faded away (mostly); I still follow his work with supergroup Prophets of Rage, ignoring their vague politics, and sticking around till the break to hear whatever weird sound Morello is going to make next.

For those unfortunate enough to have never seen this performance, here it is, in all its glory.  I recommend grabbing whoever is nearby, switching to full screen and turning the volume up as high as your device will allow.  It’s just better that way.  Enjoy!

The Edge Performing In 2009

I have a certain respect for guitarists that sound like themselves; Jeff Beck, Eddie Van Halen, Jimi Hendrix.  Players who have an instantly recognizable sound.  Those tend to be the ones I enjoy listening to the most.  Nobody sounds like himself more than the Edge.

Born David Evans, The Edge is a fascinating musician.  Unlike most mainstream guitarists, listeners actually have the ability to chart his evolution as a player.  We hear his novitiate playing on Boy become the digitally processed sounds on Songs of Innocence.  On Boy’s live recording of “Cartoon World” there is constant feedback, a whine that carries throughout the song.  We hear The Edge audibly screw up; it is one of the most natural instances of musicianship ever committed to vinyl.

Edge plays a kind of power chord that is very rare in rock, in general really.  He cuts out certain notes from the chord, the ones that make it sound full and whole.  Without the low end, the chord sounds purer, and more striking.  11 O’clock tick tock for example, is the song it is because of Edge’s chord structure.

The heart of Edge’s playing is his intimate understanding of the guitar, both its inner workings and sounds, as well as how those things can be used to augment a song.  his first guitar was one that he and his brother Richard built from scrap.  He does more than just play his instrument, he fine tunes it to make exactly the sound he wants.  One of the most amusing parts of It Might Get Loud is when Edge, during his sound check spends a solid fifteen seconds searching through his 100 plus effect presets muttering “where’s pride?”.  His songs are so varied in terms of effects, assaulting the listener with a bevy of different sounds, many of which are largely unnoticeable.  “Get On Your Boots” begins with a fuzzed out riff, which is quickly silenced.  The guitar’s output becomes reduced to strummed ghost notes and a sound that can only be described as walrus-like.  In the chorus, he goes for sustained one-strums with heavy distortion.  At about 1:20, he plays an instrumental interlude with only about twelve notes, adding the perfect touch to the song.

The Edge singing in London (also 2009)

Also characteristic of Edge’s sound are lead parts absolutely drenched in echo.  Songs like “Wire” tend to be delayed to a dizzying degree.  Aside from sounding cool, it greatly increases the effect of the songs rhythm.  In a way, it is Edge, not Adam that is the band’s rhythm player.  In “Where the Streets Have No Name” Edge’s intro carries the whole song looping back, and repeating notes, as though some ghost guitarist is playing along, repeating his notes a beat or two afterwards.  Edge is simply a master of the delay effect.  It’s not something he uses for added sustain, or a cool sound (the limit to which I’ve taken it in my own playing) instead, the delay, and any effect he uses are as much a part of the instrument as the strings and the pickups.  Rather than a filter thrown over the pictures he paints, his uses of effect are entities within the shots themselves.

Above all the Edge does not rely on spectacle.  I’ve never heard him shred on a song though I’m sure he is more than capable of carving up the fretboard with ease.  His solos are not an exercise in self-gratification, they just happen to be what the song needs at that very moment.  He metes out just the right amount of miracle into everything he does.  He can play a spectacular solo, but you can be sure it isn’t about him, it’s about the song, and the atmosphere that his playing adds to.  He creates sonic landscapes with his solos, auras of completion; little bows that wrap up the song perfectly.

The reason I like the Edge is a nebulous, ill defined, and ever changing thing.  I respect his dedication and his humbleness; I am constantly floored by his inventive guitar tones; but most of all, I like listening to the Edge because I know that there is more to come.  He is no one trick pony, he wears many hats, and still has yet to try them all on.  He has imparted nearly 40 years of musical beauty upon the world of music, but he’s not done yet.

If you’ve been to a sporting event in the last ten years or so, seen a movie trailer, or just possess a set of ears, you almost definitely have heard the opening riff to “Seven Nation Army”.  The real irony is that Jack White, writer of the most famous chord progression in music is a name unknown to many people.

White is a guitarist with a distinct sense of style.  The problems come, not when he plays music, but when he opens his mouth otherwise.  He simply feels like a remarkably inauthentic person.  In It Might Get Loud he expands upon a number of suspicious sounding events from his childhood.  He talks about his seven brothers and sisters, but the only one he really mentions by name is Meg White, who we now know to be his ex-wife.  He also discusses his living situation as a kid — sleeping on a mat so he had room for all of his instruments.

In a New Yorker article by Alec Wilkinson, published in March, White claims to have almost become a priest.

White was an altar boy, and during high school he was accepted at a seminary in Wisconsin. “I was thinking I might become a priest,” he said. “At the last moment, I learned I couldn’t bring my guitar.”

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/13/jack-whites-infinite-imagination

Check out this tidbit of insanity from the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.

Yeah, because that’s definitely how a stewardess would talk.

If indeed White’s backstories are a giant web of fabrications (a fact of which I have little doubt) he probably isn’t the first musician that this is true of.  However, he is without a doubt the most painfully obvious.  By the way, did I mention his real name isn’t even Jack White?

These are just personal details though, and they are of minimal importance to the music.  When it really becomes bothersome is when Jack’s inconsistencies relate to his music.  In It Might Get Loud he explains his choice in instruments.  He plays an Airline — a plexiglass guitar that supposedly came from a department store — and stresses a minimalistic approach to rock.  His influence is Son House, specifically his song “Grinnin’ in Your Face”, which consists simply of clapping and singing.  It is while listening to this record in the film that he talks through technology, and its role in making music.

“Technology is a big destroyer of emotion and truth. Auto-tuning doesn’t do anything for creativity. Yeah, it makes it easier and you can get home sooner; but it doesn’t make you a more creative person. That’s the disease we have to fight in any creative field: ease of use.”

This standpoint could be rebellion against The Edge, whose style relies almost entirely on technology — or simply his grab at anotherness.  What I do know is less than an hour of film later, White shows the camera a custom-made guitar that has a green bullet microphone installed into its body.  Don’t get me wrong, this is awesome; but you know what else it is? Ease of use.  Rather than interest, White’s statements only confuse.  What exactly is classified as ease of use?  The octave pedal that He uses to create the low bass sound in “Seven Nation Army” certainly wasn’t around during Son House’s time.  Technically, if one were to completely shun everything that was considered to propagate “ease of use” they should be slicing their speakers with razor blades to create distortion, or — jumping even further backwards — playing resophonic guitars, electrics are too accessible.

In the film, white takes his cheap guitar, and drops it on the floor.  He begins stomping on it, running his foot up and down the frets almost as if he is finishing off a vanquished enemy.  An ear grating sound comes from the amp.  He looks like he’s in a fight, because, well, he is.  In an interview with Guitar Player, he said “I always look at playing guitar as an attack. It has to be a fight. Every song, every guitar solo, every note that’s played or written has to be a struggle.”  This is not idle talk.  the violence of his M.O. comes across in his playing.  “The Switch and the Spur” by the Raconteurs is a prime example.  When White plays his solo, his solo has the feel of a near finished struggle; of choking the life out of something.  Watching him play this song, you can even see the aggression in his movements on the fret board.  Pay attention to just how high he bends the string at 2:45.

What White lacks in profundity of speech he makes up for with great, and well varied music.  White has made himself a part of a great many groups and projects over the years.  The White Stripes, of course, but also the lesser known Raconteurs, and Dead Weather, as well as his own solo material.  His multifariousness is clearest on “Yellow Sun” a Raconteurs song that features springy keyboards and acoustic strumming.  The chorus is sung in harmony, with what seem to be three voices, one of which is ridiculously high.

Another great song is “Steady as She Goes”.  The song opens with a bass riff that sounds like a slower more subdued take on “Superfreak” by Rick James, followed by a chilling tremolo riff on the guitar.  This song goes to show how well Jack White’s playing can work with other people.  The Raconteurs are really the first time White has worked with a group of more than two for an extended period of time, and I’ll always argue that its the best music he’s ever produced.  Something about creative control being divided must bring out the best in him.

White’s forays into electronic music are not remotely displeasureable either.  The Dead Weather’s “Bone House” is rife with artificial drum sounds and buzzing synthesized chord progressions.  This music violates the very principles Jack White claims to stand behind, but it is great stuff nonetheless.

The thing about Jack White that I hate is not necessarily his eschewing technology, but the fact that he claims to, but doesn’t.  If he were to abandon this bizarre and falsified musical code, I would be very grateful, but White is a man of showmanship, and his propensity for charade will likely never cease.  My resolution, is to ignore his theatrics, and simply enjoy the great music he produces.

As for anyone looking to delve into White’s vast musical catalogue, I recommend Consolers of the Lonely, by the Raconteurs as a starting point.