Bitter-Sweet

By Josh Tyrangiel

When Jack White isn't singing, he may be the most thoroughly unendurable rock star since Sting. White insists that he and drummer Meg White are brother and sister (they're actually ex-husband and wife); he also considers himself a modern bluesman, wears his red band uniform offstage and uses the liner notes of his new album, Elephant, for a jeremiad on "the death of the sweetheart." He's like a vigilante grad student holding a highlighter pen to your throat--except when he sings. Jack White can really sing.

White has a voice like Robert Plant's: he's electric in his upper register, and he brings the perfect tension to songs about sex and longing. Blessedly, Elephant, the White Stripes' fourth album, is all about sex and longing. Seven Nation Army and There's No Home for You Here are grinding guitar classics about postbreakup frustration. (Brother and sister? Sure.) Ball and Biscuit is classically naughty and bluesy, while You've Got Her in Your Pocket and I Want to Be the Boy to Warm Your Mother's Heart are soft, hymnal and far sweeter than you would think White capable of. ("What kind of cartwheels do I have to pull," he asks in the chorus of Mother's Heart. "What kind of jokes should I lay on her now?")

Musically, Elephant adheres to the band's simple formula. Meg plays drums, Jack sings over his alternately wailing and intimate guitar. There are a few bass chords and an organ thrown in, but it's minimalist rock with maximum thrust. Just skip the liner notes. --By Josh Tyrangiel