Out & About

Detroit makes sublime, no-frills rock bands the way Mexico distills tequila: It goes down smooth but has a wicked kick. We’re not referring to the Huge Nuge or Alice Cooper’s custom-built chassis here. And we’re really not talking about au courant fashions like the Go or Slumber Party. Think more along the lines of the MC5 or Stooges, blues-based primal ids letting go of that tenuous grasp of normalcy.

The boy-girl, guitar-drum duo the White Stripes are Detroit’s latest breaths of fresh air. A quirky firestorm of self-conscious attitude and rambling wit, the Stripes’ wrangling country-blues and garage-spunk has sparked some choice cuts in their two-year career. And it’s got many young ones and cynical critics rediscovering the kick that straight-up rock delivers. But in many ways, the Stripes simply revisit the Gories, that last great Detroit explosion of fuzz and fever that peaked at the dawn of the early ’90s garage-punk revival (see the Mummies, Jon Spencer and the entire Estrus catalog). Only the Stripes already have a higher profile than the Gories ever enjoyed, even if The New York Times‘ boast about the band–that it’s “hurling your basic rock at the arty crowd”–sounds suspiciously familiar. When the Gories’ debut Houserockin’ burned out of Motor City like a ’72 Dodge Charger and crashed into the Big Apple, Gerard Cosloy quipped that Collins’ power-tool guitar crunch made every NYC avant-garde guitarist shit.

The chops and pipes behind the Stripes, Jack White, has been greeted with a similar fanfare, especially since the Stripes’ latest outing, White Blood Cells, boasts 16 tracks of original material, shirking the band’s usual inclusion of barn-burning takes on traditional blues found on last year’s De Stijl and its 1999 self-titled debut. It’s prompted the pair to shy away from interviews presently, suspecting they’re getting overexposed, though it may be a little late for that. But the key to the Stripes is drummer Meg White. For some reason, women drummers simply know how to beat the traps in a steady pound-pound that fits stripped-down power better than the boys. Through Lou Reed and John Cale’s arguments over the Velvet Underground’s sound, Mo Tucker provided the gritty firmament to its Lower East Side glide. Margaret Ann “Peg” O’Neill set the pace for the Gories. And Karen Singletary somehow managed to keep Supercharger from rocketing into complete ineptitude.

It’s no different for the Stripes. Jack’s the lyrical mack daddy who gets the gals jiggy, but Meg’s the peg on which Jack hangs his tooth-and-nail wail. Her swing-kick cymbal slaps set a lurid no-tell motel scene in “Hotel Yorba.” She’s the driving force behind “Fell in Love With a Girl.” And her crash-boom-bash is the trick that sticks with you through “Expecting.” Like the wrist-flick guitar chug that electrifies a midverse tempo change in “Now Mary,” there’s absolutely nothing about the Stripes that ain’t been tried, plied and perfected before. But like the ambiguous relationship between Jack and Meg–whether they’re really brother and sister or ex-spouses, as rumored–that’s just not the point. Enjoy it while it last, kids.