The White Stripes Biography
Their follow-up to White Blood Cells, entitled Elephant, was released on April 1, 2003, again to widespread critical acclaim.
Detail:
Detroit minimalist rock duo (specifically, southwest Detroit
minimalist rock duo) the White Stripes -- Jack White, guitar and
vocals, Meg White, drums -- formed in 1997 (Bastille Day, to be
precise) with the idea of making simple rock & roll music. From the
red and white peppermint candy motif of their debut singles,
self-titled album, and stage show to their on-the-surface
rudimentary style, they succeeded wildly and immediately with that
mission. Their first recordings were a mix of garage rock, blues,
and the occasional show tune. In frontman Jack (a former drummer for
Detroit country outfit Goober & the Peas), the White Stripes have a
formidable songwriter, guitar player, and vocalist capable of both
morphing between styles and changing the musical styles themselves;
ranging from the folk blues of Blind Willie McTell to soaring Kinks-esque
pop and narrative pop tunes worthy of Cole Porter and into deepest
Captain Beefheart territory within the span of 15 minutes is not an
uncommon listening experience with either the White Stripes live
show or on record. In drummer Meg, the White Stripes have a
minimalist percussionist who seems to sense intuitively exactly when
to not play. The White Stripes are grounded in punk and blues, but
the undercurrent to all of their work has been the aforementioned
striving for simplicity, a love of American folk music, and a
careful approach to intriguing, emotional, and evocative lyrics not
found anywhere else in the modern punk, or garage rock (or amongst
post-modern "blues" practitioners such as Jon Spencer, for that
matter).
While they may have sprung from the Detroit rock scene (and they
remain regular fixtures on the Detroit club circuit with Jack
producing or working with many Detroit-area bands), the White
Stripes quickly gained a national following after two successive
tours with indie rockers Pavement and Sleater-Kinney in 1999 and
2000. The White Stripes released their second LP, De Stijl, in 2000
and it further spread the group's reputation. They followed its
release with successful tours of Japan and Australia and entered the
Memphis studio of renowned producer Doug Easley for 2001's White
Blood Cells. The album was a critical smash and the White Stripes
soon found themselves, along with the Strokes and the Hives, at the
forefront of the new wave of rock & roll bands poised to take over
the world. The band certainly did their best to acheive world
domination, appearing on Late Night with David Lettterman, being
written about in Time, the New Yorker and Entertainment Weekly,
playing the MTV Movie Awards and having their video for "Fell in
Love with a Girl" in heavy rotation on MTV. They also made the tough
decision to jump to a major label; White Blood Cells was reissued on
V2 in January of 2002 and their first two records followed suit in
June. The White Stripes truly became big time rock stars when their
"Fell in Love with a Girl" clip was nominated for four MTV Video
Awards including Best Video of the Year (alongside Eminem and *NSYNC!),
Breakthrough Video, Best Special Effects in a Video and Best Editing
in a Video. That summer the group also played four triumphant shows
with the Strokes, two apiece in the bands' respective hometowns. In
spring 2003 their fourth full-length Elephant -- recorded in two
weeks at London's Toerag Studio and dedicated to "the death of the
sweetheart" -- arrived to nearly unanimous critical acclaim.
Discography