Music May 23, 2012 at 4:00 am

The Caretaker

Only Jack White Can S(t)ave Rock and Roll from Obscurity

Paul Constant
Not the new Bob Dylan. Courtesy Jack White
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Comments

1
Did anyone at the Stranger see Black Keys on May 8?
biffp on May 23, 2012 at 12:38 PM Report this
2
The Black Keys are the absolute nail in the coffin...terrible music made by terrible people
Chris Jury on May 23, 2012 at 12:48 PM Report this
3
If you want me to stop rocking, I hope you're prepared to sand off my face!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnyCJDYON…
Spindles on May 23, 2012 at 12:49 PM Report this
4
Not sure what you mean by rock n'roll here. There are certainly more dynamic genres of it that are doing far more with it than Jack White. Unless of course you just mean bare-bones, blues-based, commercial guitar rock.
on May 23, 2012 at 12:52 PM Report this
5
@3 - thank you.
Dougsf on May 23, 2012 at 12:54 PM Report this
6
Worst troll ever.
Jeff on May 23, 2012 at 12:58 PM Report this
7
Also, no matter what we come up with as to the health of rock music... kids only know what they know, you know? It doesn't really matter how we hear it.
Dougsf on May 23, 2012 at 1:01 PM Report this
8
Um, no.

On an aside, a friend of mine just got her Justin Bieber badge - Rock and Roll is alive and well and living in Canada.
Will in Seattle on May 23, 2012 at 1:04 PM Report this
9
Blunderbuss is as good at it gets for today's rock.

I listened once on Rhapsody.

I will listen again.
Supreme Ruler Of The Universe on May 23, 2012 at 1:08 PM Report this
11
Do you guys in Seattle take Paul Constant seriously?
on May 23, 2012 at 1:10 PM Report this
12
Was there ever an "active" golden age for Adult Contemporary?
longball on May 23, 2012 at 1:12 PM Report this
13
Three-chord songs will never die. They will also never really be all that new and innovative except perhaps for listeners too young to have heard it all before.

The need for popular music to constantly re-invent itself has more to do with marketing than any honest assessment of musical innovation. Most "revolutions" in pop music amount to new curtains on a hundred-year-old house.
on May 23, 2012 at 1:22 PM Report this
14
Every pop writer has to declare rock mostly dead every year or so because they always believe they lived through the pinnacle.
on May 23, 2012 at 1:27 PM Report this
15
Everything is dead. Where is my instant gratification?
Foonken2 on May 23, 2012 at 1:36 PM Report this
16
If there is anything I have learned from years in the music industry it is this: The moment you say something is dead, it comes raging back like a trend zombie. Trend Zombies can be seen in many shapes and forms. Have you considered the idea of a Libyan Riot Girl Three Piece? Maybe the US won't lead the march on Rock anymore (after all, we have decided that since we all can't be rockstars, we must destroy them or turn them into a video game)

The "death" of rock and roll is symmetrically correlated with the death of the rock mentality. We just don't have it here right now.
Digitocalypse on May 23, 2012 at 1:37 PM Report this
17
You've just now noticed? Rock & Roll has been dead for a good three decades, at least. That 65-year-old Mick Jagger is still doing it even though HE said nobody over 45 should be playing rock & roll speaks volumes...
orino on May 23, 2012 at 1:39 PM Report this
18
So the argument is that because Rock and Roll is white guys playing electric guitars, all rock and roll is somewhat derivative, and therefore bad. However, Jack White (a white guy playing electric guitar) does it a LOT and his most recent album is especially derivative, but somehow this is good?
jath on May 23, 2012 at 1:41 PM Report this
19
@10: No, the problem is exactly as Paul Constant says - rock and roll is no longer a living, growing, developing art form. Everything you can do with guitar, bass, drums, and vocal has more or less been done, leaving few if any possibilities to do something big and original.

Back when the genre was alive, older generations hated what the kids were listening to because they didn't understand it - it sounded like nothing they'd heard before.

Now that rock has hit the wall, older generations hate what the kids are listening to because they understand it all too well, they've heard it thousands of times already, and unless you're just discovering this stuff, it's an obvious cliche.

Sure, people will still play rock, just like they do the blues, chamber music, blue-grass, klezmer music, and other genres of the past.
seandr on May 23, 2012 at 1:43 PM Report this
20
@17: Three decades? No, rock was still alive in the 80's thanks to hardcore punk and thrash metal. Its demise began in 1994 when Kurt Cobain shot himself in the head.

@18: "Derivative" isn't necessary a problem, but "cliche" certainly is.

seandr on May 23, 2012 at 1:51 PM Report this
21
21: No, actually metal killed rock. And the metal subgenres are now the main exponents of rock. Thrash was just a precursor.
on May 23, 2012 at 2:39 PM Report this
23
You know, I keep trying and trying to resist the easy idea that 'rock died with Kurt'... I guess because it IS too easy, and certainly folks rocked out after 1994, for sure they're rocking out to this day...

But somehow, I just keep coming back to Kurt, I keep seeing those eyes.. If it's too easy and too large somehow to make the claim that rock died when Kurt did, I still can't seem to escape the idea that actually Kurt was the last true Rock Artist. He was the last one who was sincere about it. There was no artifice with him, and that's probably what killed him: he had no insulating layer between himself and The Fame that Came...

It just feels as if there's been no one since him, certainly no one at that level, who could reach us the way he did.
merry on May 23, 2012 at 3:51 PM Report this
24
I will say, all of the proselytizing & opining like that above seems to be pretty far away from rock, whatever it is. "I know it when I see it."
UberAlles on May 23, 2012 at 3:57 PM Report this
25
@22: Oh come on, man, don't be boring.

It's self-evident that heavy metal, punk, hardcore, thrash, new wave, emo, grunge, psychedelic rock, baroque pop, and everything else on this page are just different types of rock and roll. The fact that you play rock faster with more distortion and an extra bass drum doesn't make it stop being rock.

And yes, like any musical genre, rock is largely defined by the instruments used to produce it.
seandr on May 23, 2012 at 4:11 PM Report this
26
Ugh. If I wanted to read limp writing on rock n roll authored by a sexless wimp I'd read Chuck Klosterman.
McGee on May 23, 2012 at 4:28 PM Report this
27
Sigh.
Dean Fawkes on May 23, 2012 at 5:18 PM Report this
28
What would the Stranger do without advertising for all of the bland, derivative crap music played in Seattle every night? Let's be realistic.
lambcannon on May 23, 2012 at 5:21 PM Report this
30
American literature is dead. Only Jonathan Franzen can save it. I say that with all the authority that Paul Constant commands vis a vis rock and roll.
biffp on May 24, 2012 at 9:25 AM Report this
32
If Jack (load) White is the savior of rock, I might as well put my bass down and stick sewing needles into my eardrums. God I hate that guy and any pod scum with opposable digits who kiss his ass.
fish-is-a-bassist on May 24, 2012 at 3:12 PM Report this
33
@32 ftw. You don't know jackshit if you think Jack White is anything but a self promotion machine. This is the same stupid story every self-righteous midlife crisis disaster feels compelled to write as a psa.
biffp on May 24, 2012 at 3:23 PM Report this
34
This article sounds like it was written on Jack
Whites chubby.
ShitTimmySez on May 24, 2012 at 5:53 PM Report this
35
The Stranger needs younger writers who aren't so disconnected from the current music scene. Jack White the savior of rock and roll? Okay, Dad.
on May 27, 2012 at 2:34 PM Report this
36
i read this article because i just got back from playing at sasquatch festival and caught Jack White's set. i thought he was ok, but definitely not the "caretaker" of rock and roll. His new band was pretty good, but as he introduced them one by one he would play little guitar solos that kinda went nowhere, rather than letting them take solos. That was weird to me, as well as his odd fake southern accent.
Just before he played i stumbled into a set by St. Vincent. i had never heard of her and don't know if she is considered "rock and roll", but she was rocking out in a much more compelling and unique way, combining her heavy vintage guitar sound with the band's precise drum and keyboard work. As i was watching her set i was actually thinking about this being the first time in a long time that i was excited by some new rock and roll. Her set had old elements worked into a new formula, and compared to her Jack White frankly seemed a little bit like a shtick.
on May 27, 2012 at 11:00 PM Report this

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