Somewhere Loretta Lynn is smiling
The White Stripes have always been full of surprises, but even for them this album is still awkwardly random. Don't let the single "Blue Orchid" fool you, because that's about as guitar-happy as Jack White gets on this entire album. In a stark contrast to their other albums where dense and rich layered sounds were the norm, on Get Behind Me Satan you find something that sounds, quite frankly, empty. Songs like "The Nurse" and "Forever For Her" feel half-baked and incomplete and then on the other hand, the piano heavy tracks such as "My Doorbell," "Denial Twist" and "Take, Take, Take" all sound basically the same. That's not to say that it's all bad in the land of White Stripes, "Blue Orchid" is still one hell of a track, as is "As Ugly As I Seem," and then despite it's weirdness "Red Rain" is also a relatively interesting track. No matter how you slice it "Little Ghost" is just strange, while on the surface it seems relatively traditional bluegrass, in the scheme of this album it almost seems sadistic, but maybe that was the point. While it's all fine and good that Jack and Meg White want to approach music in different ways, it doesn't seem logical for them to go so far as completely eliminating what each of them doing best. In Jack's case, that's playing his blues-influenced guitar licks, and Meg playing her primitive, but effective drum patterns. Otherwise it's just as good as The Rolling Stones going in and releasing 13 tracks of a capella songs, I'm sure it'd sound nice, but it's not really their strong suit. It seems that despite the effort, this album is more of a step back for the White Stripes than any real advancement, but maybe after producing Loretta Lynn's Van Lear Rose, Jack White needed to get some bluegrass out of his system. Let's hope he's back to typical form next time around.
★★★½
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