Somewhere between his increasingly whimsical solo albums, and certainly once he started policing the public's cellphones, it became clear that Jack White was not the uninhibited maverick he played so convincingly with the White Stripes. Since that duo broke up in 2011, White has been systematically sucking almost all the fun out of his image, revealing that this avatar of effortless cool was actually bound by a complex code of unwritten rules he was happy to lecture music publications about . It was a turn akin to seeing the coolest senior in your high school return as the district's biggest nerd as a substitute teacher.
What a difference a record can make. Of all the major achievements on White's raucous, ripping, unrelenting sixth solo album, without a nameperhaps most notable is how cleanly it wipes the slate clean after a decade-plus of traditional rebuke, divisive experimentation, and creative failure. without a name reconnects White to the primal urges that made the Stripes so undeniable. It's a comeback that's instantly heralded as a contender for White's best solo record yet: 42 minutes of dynamic blues punk that reveals that old Jack White was behind the curtain all along, hungry and unrelenting, waiting for the right moment to re-enter.
Thanks to clever guerrilla marketing, without a name arrives with the scheduled delivery. It was released by surprise on July 19th at White's Third Man Records stores, where incredibly white press sleeves were slipped into the bags of unsuspecting customers. However, it wasn't like the days when White hid 7″s inside upholstered furniture. He wanted people to hear and discover this record, and Third Man's social media accounts encouraged fans to “rip” it and share it. .The raw immediacy of the project initially suggested it might be a throwback, a palette cleanser before White got back into the studio, but its triple octane and sticky hooks hinted at something more lasting and substantial. The White Stripes weren't so collected.
The all killer, no filler ethos is far from over The fear of Dawnthe utterly gonzo solo record White released in 2022. Where that record invited listeners to admire his artistry and fawn over his sadistically contrarian creative choices, without a name he leans into his more intuitive, meat-and-potatoes impulses. Opener “Old Scratch Blues” hits with the heaviness of Led Zeppelin's most titanic riffs, while “That's How I'm Feeling” plays like a belated stab at one last great rock renaissance-style single. “Bombing Out” might be the most compelling two and a half minutes of hard drive you'll hear from a 49-year-old this year.
