Review
'No Name', Jack White's latest solo outing, is an unflinching return to his sonic roots in garage rock, blues rock, and punk blues. By getting back to basics, White creates a restless, uncompromising sound that's direct, loud, and bracing. The guitars are fat and dirty, the drums crash like a sudden storm, and the hooks just keep coming. In tracks like 'Old Scratch Blues', 'Bless Yourself', and 'Bombing Out', White plumbs the raw energy of the blues and spits it back out as punk-informed rock and roll.
'Bless Yourself' could almost be a White Stripes cut - there's something primal and untamed about White's attack, a furious exuberance that threatens to burst free from the instruments themselves. White's craft, though, is what sets him apart: witness the glorious cacophony of 'It's Rough On Rats', where slippery piano lines dance above his crunching guitar, a stunning textural mismatch that produces its own brand of electric excitement.
Behind the music's no-frills presentation lies an equally compelling release strategy. Straight-faced jokester White unleashed 'No Name' via white-label vinyls with neither marketing machines nor hype surrounding its arrival, defying expectations at every step. Given that kind of history-making spirit, standout trysts with track titles 'That’s How I’m Feeling', 'Archbishop Harold Holmes', and 'Old Scratch Blues' don't come as surprise; there, his unique manner both charges towards infectious forceful choruses and dissolves quietly into dark musical zones and subtle detail working, forming at once a musical feast and journey from Jack White. - Aubrey
