NYC Meets The Dead Weather, the New White Kids
For weeks we’ve been issued measured glimpses of The Dead Weather —styled, black-and-white-and-hair-and-bangs-and-leather press shots of Jack White, Alison Mosshart (The Kills, Discount), Jack Lawrence (The Raconteurs, The Greenhornes) and Dean Fertita (Queens of the Stone Age). They’ve fed fans streams of “Hang You From the Heavens” and “Are Friends Electric” and disseminated hand-made 7”’s to a lucky 200 or so people invited to a surprise show by the band at the new headquarters of White’s Third Man Records a month ago.
Then, on a dreary Tuesday night in NYC, a bigger horde of concertgoers at Bowery Ballroom got the full picture. Aside from the $30 limited edition show posters that were stuck between New York and Nashville, The Dead Weather rolled out exactly as White planned it. This is his fourth band if you don’t count his occasional work with The Go or his colllabos with Alicia Keys or Loretta Lynn, and he comes to every project (even his Warholian factory-style record label) with a vision. The Upholsterers was his blue-collar start-up venture, a nod to the need for a day job. The White Stripes was his experiment in stripped down rock and gussied up, two-tone, peppermint-flavored fashion. With the Raconteurs he nailed the full band dynamic. And now with The Dead Weather, he’s married just about everything he’s done right so far to make dirty-cool rock ‘n’ roll.
A four-piece with a strict black-and-white (and occasional deep maroon) dress code (even the roadies were in matching black suits), the group has the trappings of bona fide blues outfit and the chops of punks. The stage on Tuesday looked like White’s own musical menagerie, an homage to his years of gear collecting, from the rectangular Bo Diddley-style guitar strapped to Mosshart, to the hulking twin vintage Leslie speaker cabinets whirling in the corners whenever Fertita pressed on the organ.
Lanky Lawrence, with his straight black locks, coke-bottle spectacles and oversized white bass, looked like Tim Burton’s version of a King of Leon. Fertita ping-ponged between keyboards and guitars and shredded both. Mosshart slinked around like Iggy Pop or Chrissie Hynde and whipped her hair like a child of ‘80s metal (I swear it was in slo-mo). She spent a good half of the set turned away from the crowd to White behind the drums, as if to sing to him in her perfectly pitched, crackly, vampy voice. At times she was like the female him. They both come to The Dead Weather from two-piece outfits, and act like a duo within the group. They have an Ike-and-Tina vibe, minus the violence.
For White’s part, he’s learned to ride shotgun in the lineup. But he still makes his drum playing the central focus—he’s not always a perfect player, but he feels the music like a veteran bluesman. The group is trading some precision for image, and an audience packed with indie rock luminaries and the spare actor seemed content with the bargain. White did come out front for bit to play guitar and share a vocal mike with Mosshart—there was barely room for cigarette smoke between their lips.
Wherever White was, though, he was always the front man.
The Dead Weather @ Bowery Ballroom 4/14/09 from Kibbe on Vimeo.
The Dead Weather @ Bowery Ballroom 4/14/09 from Kibbe on Vimeo.
