There’s hardly a musician of the younger generation who knows how to handle myths and truths as good as Jack White. Whether him and Meg White were bound to each other through brotherly blood or marriage is not even to be solved by the alleged divorce papers – for these kind of questions, Mr. White is too much of a fox and the rest of the world too suspicious. But okay, the White Stripes are music-history by now and after that, their very own hog-blues has been unmatched, so far. There have been a few okay-ish albums together with The Raconteurs and Dead Weather, but was that supposed to show us the severity of a man, who could send people into ecstasies with »Ball & Biscuit«? Now, with »Blunderbuss«, there’s a solo-debut which raised our hopes, especially since White did not have to make any compromises and could instead follow his very own ideas. Those are to be found exactly between the coordinates Blues, Indie and Country. Unfortunately. Because the unbridled madness, with which Jack White can press his own voice into a rhythm, or with which he fingers the guitar, only shines through in very rare moments. »Freedom At 21« gives us an idea about how hard it must be to not follow that impulse, but then again, those might be the very best three minutes of »Blunderbuss«. Other than that, there’s again the Wild-West-piano, acoustic guitars and purring background singing. And even though in the end, »Take Me With You When You Go« tries to steer the opposite direction, Jack White’s guitar can’t break through the slightly dusty arrangement. But all this is probably to be filed under »mellowing with age«. The only song still encouraging us to tear our living rooms apart is »Sixteen Saltines« – the other songs can then be listened to while calmly cleaning up the mess.
Blunderbuss
