What's New

Artists A-C

Artists D-F

Artists G-I

Artists J-L

Artists M-O

Artists P-R

Artists S-U

Artists V-Z

Various - ...King Funk

Various - Stax of Funk

White Stripes - White Blood Cells

Shannon Wright - Flightsafety

X - Los Angeles

X - Wild Gift

ALBUM REVIEWS

Pick of the Chick: Our Favorite Releases, 1999-Present

THE WHITE STRIPES
WHITE BLOOD CELLS
SYMPATHY FOR THE RECORD INDUSTRY

Remember when music was fun?  The White Stripes do.  On White Blood Cells, band members Meg and Jack White fuse punk angst with a hodge-podge of musical genres from the late '60s and early '70s.  The garage-rock romp "Fell in Love with a Girl" could be a Kinks out-take.  "Expecting" and "The Union Forever" scream of Black Sabbath.  "The Same Boy You've Always Known" and "We're Going to be Friends" borrow heavily from the McCartney-penned Beatles catalogue, or is it the Wings catalogue?  White Blood Cells is totally derivative, but half the fun is trying to figure out what songs the White Stripes are "lifting" from the pages of rock-n-roll history.  White Blood Cells should provide some relief (and hope) for those folks who feel that indie rock has gotten too high brow.

PIGEONHOLE: Punk angst meets the "ghost of rock-n-roll past."
CAVEATS: This album is totally derivative of late-'60s and early-'70s rock.  Those listeners who are searching for something original should skip this one.

Andrew Helminger

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