The Jack White song he didn’t enjoy playing live: “It’s a harsh rhythm”
If you’re the curmudgeonly sort who constantly blabbers on about how rock music needs a ‘saviour’, then you’ll probably be of the opinion that Jack White has been single-handedly carrying that mantle for the best part of 25 years. It’s not wrong to think that either, given that he’s continued to release music of the highest calibre across his multiple different projects throughout his career, whether that’s with the iconic duo The White Stripes, in either of his supergroups The Raconteurs or The Dead Weather or by himself.
His latest solo venture, No Name, is a thrill-a-minute exploration of blues, garage rock and raucous punk energy, proving that he is still not running out of creative steam and can still revisit the sounds of his past and make them as exciting as ever. In addition to continuing to release new music, he runs the independent record label Third Man and still somehow finds time to tour. On these tours, he still digs up songs that cover the entirety of his oeuvre and has remarkably stuck to his fascinating principle of never creating a setlist for any of his shows to avoid any repetition.
While this is probably gruelling for anyone in White’s ever-changing live band, who need to be flexible enough to drop into every part of his repertoire at the shortest notice, it does also mean that White himself is acutely aware of which of his songs are going to work with certain iterations of his band and which ones won’t. One song that White has not so much denounced as acknowledged its shortcomings when played live is ‘My Doorbell’ – one that is still a fan favourite despite White’s reluctance to play it.
Taken from The White Stripes’ piano-heavy fifth record, Get Behind Me Satan, ‘My Doorbell’ is characterised by its heavy-handed piano chords and Meg White’s ever-reliable thunderous drumming, something that Jack notes is crucial to not just that song but the whole of their work together.
“She really made the songs we wrote back then,” he says, “she brought them to life.”
But it’s not necessarily down to Meg White’s absence when playing it live that makes it frustrating for Jack White to play, he insists. “I love to sing ‘My Doorbell,’ but I don’t like to play the notes,” he explained in an interview with Rolling Stone. “It’s a harsh rhythm. I wish I could play the drums and sing it.”
There isn’t anything stopping Jack White from taking to the kit on stage for live renditions of the song, as he’s proven himself to be a more than competent drummer/vocalist through his work on two albums with The Dead Weather, although his stance on the song did seem to shift during the tour for his 2018 album Boarding House Reach.
Having recruited Autolux drummer Carla Azar as master of the tubs for that record and subsequent tour, he came to realise that her style was a perfect substitute for Meg White’s part on ‘My Doorbell’. “She’s really perfect for this tour – she’s just completely unafraid to dive right in,” Jack says of Azar’s playing. Whether the song will be dragged out of the woodwork for the currently ongoing No Name tour remains to be seen, but let’s hope he’s found his peace with the song once again.
