Who would have thought that the two upcoming dates at the Fillmore June 4 and 5 featuring The White Stripes would sell out in one fucking day? I couldn’t believe it when my attempts to purchase a pair of tickets online kept coming back with an unavailable notice. I kept trying again thinking it was a computer server problem or something but apparently not. I don’t even think the shows were advertised yet and they’re both sold out completely. I quickly went to E-bay and saw a handful of pairs of tickets for auction and that confirmed my disbelief—The White Stripes had indeed sold out two nights at the Fillmore, and to my knowledge, it hadn’t even been announced in the local rags. I knew about the dates through the newsletter I’ve signed up for online at the White Stripes website, but I didn’t even think tickets would disappear so quickly. Maybe it was their appearance on David Letterman, or their video going into heavy rotation on MTV as buzz worthy, or perhaps it’s the whirlwind of attention they’ve managed to whip up in England, or maybe it was the recent article in The New Yorker which asked the question “Will pop—Britney, J.Lo, N Sync and the rest kill rock?” then provides The White Stripes, The Strokes and The Hives as possible saviours of the devils music for that publications high-brow ever-hard rocking readership. Who knows why a band becomes a sensation? I’d like to think in the case of The White Stripes it’s because their purist approach and pared down line-up and genuine respect and love of rock and blues really struck a chord with people, reminding them of the enthusiasm and zeal of seminal rock and roll with a touch of the D.I.Y. ethics of punk rock thrown in, not to mention a particular civic pride and support and identification with their home town of Detroit and it’s music scene both past and present, and finally their fabricated insistence that they are brother and sister and all the mystery and speculation that claim creates. I can say that I knew they were going to be big from the first time I heard their debut LP. It was like a wake-up call in the tepid, snooze-y post-everything world of rock. To quote another band pegged as possible rock and roll salvation from that New Yorker article, The Hives, “Hate to say I told you so.” But not really.
It seems like only yesterday when I saw The White Stripes play at Bottom Of The Hill and they didn’t even headline. That was barely over two years ago and they have steadily gone everywhere with a bullet ever since, their third LP White Blood Cells reaching number 61 on Billboards top 200 earning a pace-setter and heat-seeker rating for an artist hitting the top 100 for the first time and making the most significant move up the charts that week. I’ve gathered from things I’ve read on their website (www.whitestripes.com) and heard them say live that the White Stripes have a certain fondness for San Francisco and their fans here, citing this as the place where the big red and white ball started rolling towards their growing popularity as they literally criss-crossed the globe for two years solid. They certainly played here enough to make us feel a bit favored I’d say. If you were among the lucky enough to score tickets to their upcoming shows in June, it’s fair to anticipate a greatness to match the hype. In fact, let me quote a bit of my review from about a year and a half ago, the last time they played the Fillmore: Admittedly, Jack White is a total wild man on guitar, like if he didn’t have it to smack and strum and jerk and pound he would explode, and sometimes he does seem to be serving up twice the amount of a normal player, but Meg on drums (and he did introduce her as his sister) matches his frenetic pace with a completely different approach. Her beats are powerful but spare and minimal, languid and sultry and they find their place in the frenzy with a strong sense that almost seems psychic or para-normal, as if perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the blood coursing through their veins is the blood of siblings, if indeed they are brother and sister. If they are not then won’t I feel stupid? However this quality, this incredibly connected and intuitive dynamic they share really came to the fore so many times during their set, which turned into a most adventurous and unpredictable kind of medley featuring drastically different versions of their familiar songs, snippets of familiar riffs of famous songs that would turn into something of theirs before you could identify what you were reminded of, and frequent drastic pace changes executed flawlessly as they looked into each others eyes, smiling like they were sharing a joke. They did an amazing version of “Jolene,” the Dolly Parton song that started out very quiet and sensitive with original gender intact and eventually turned into an intense emotional blowout that had the crowd going nuts. Jack White was evoking the spirit of one musical icon after another, with his voice and his guitar, like Elvis, Hank Williams, Jimmy Page, Donovan, Dylan, Guthrie, Jerry Lee, Prince, Lead Belly, I’m not kidding! It went on and on—seamless reverential soul-stirring fucking brilliance. It was pretty apparent that the crowd at the Fillmore knew they were witnessing something special and great. Nearly every song from their two LPs that is rendered in a more acoustic or soft style on record was turned into a harder louder or more intense version live, like the romantic little ditty “Sweet Little Apple Blossom,” which was transformed into a monstrous lust-fuelled rave-up so wanton and sexy it was kind of scary. Everything happened so fast. In one minutes time he could evoke lilting country blue grass, raunchy blues, Led Zeppelin and the staccato post-punk guitar shards of Gang of Four! It was amazing. I left the show feeling like I had just seen something of historical importance, or that rock and roll does make life worth living.
Am I setting you up for disappointment by building this up too much? I don’t think so, not in the house that Jack and Meg built. These shows will be a promise fulfilled, coming from a White House of a different kind.
Speaking of glorious institutions of a not so different kind, it’s been quite a week at the Vatican, huh? Their first ever sexual abuse summit with all the American Cardinals ordered to report to the Vatican where the Pope planned to address an issue that has more recently cast an ugly pallor upon the face of the Catholic church, specifically in America where the problem is amplified according to the Pope, by the media. That issue is sexual abuse of children by priests. Boy, now that it’s all out in the open I bet everyone feels a lot better already, and now that the Pope is abreast of this terrible situation I’m sure things will change a great deal and soon. It’s really quite atrocious, the thought of spiritual leaders taking advantage of innocent children in a sexual way, using their position of power to molest children who in turn keep it a secret out of fear and sustain serious psycho-sexual damage into adulthood, even possibly perpetuating a similar chain of abuse in their own lives, and all because of the unrealistic vow of celibacy inherent in Catholicism for centuries. Now that the problem has been brought to the fore of international attention, it’s odd that the one thing that simply will not change is arguably the cause of the abuse, that priests are required to be celibate.
Now there’s going to be debates and decisions on so many levels regarding how to respond to or punish those priests accused of sexual abuse. There will be distinctions made between current abuses by priests, priests guilty of past abuses, priests who were “notorious” serial abusers, predatory to minors, or even unjustly accused. And don’t think for a minute that instances and reports of abuse from decades ago aren’t going to stream in at a rate similar to the birthrate in third world countries where unwanted children are born every minute because birthcontrol is a sin and the Vatican has denied educating people that a condom can prevent another starving child or a compromised quality of life. For that matter how many AIDS deaths can also be attributed to the Vatican for their reluctance to address the issue of safe sexual practices? And isn’t it hysterical that there’s a “one strike you’re out” policy that applies solely to priests, a simple variation on a policy previously reserved for the predominantly ethnic prison population of America?
Cardinal Bernard Law, Archbishop of Boston and hot NAMBLA top, who has protected accused priests by moving them to new locations at the churches expense has stated, “These are not easy days to serve in the pastoral role that is mine,” and then called for a special day of prayer about the sexual abuse crisis, to be held in early May. Hell, I figured by this point the Catholic Church had gotten quite used to apologizing for atrocities committed throughout the centuries, the Spanish Inquisition, all those Christians, the Holocaust, and everything else the pope tried to atone for on his “I’m Really Really Sorry” world tour a few years back. It seems I was underestimating the Pope and his faculties based on his near comatose appearance on Easter this year, because his address to the cardinals assembled last week at the summit found him talking out of both sides of his mouth and sounding like he was really saying something but he was merely passing the buck to the cardinals to take action on this, “Gentlemen, start defrocking…but consider each individual case.”
I liked the ideas put forth by the newly formed Committee for Prevention of Sex Abuse by Clergy. They really know how to hit the church right where it lives. They have called on fellow Catholics to withhold any donations to the church until it adopts a zero tolerance policy on sex abuse. Besides mass murder, what do Catholic Priests like more than fucking little boys and all that cold hard cash? Maybe wearing lavish gowns?
The night of the summit while I was Djing at The Hole In The Wall, I managed to throw together a set of songs all dealing with The Pope, Pedophilia, and Pervert Priests. My favorite song of the lot was a wonderfully fast and expressive cut by The Impotent Sea Snakes called Pope John Paul Can Suck My Dick. It tells the story of a guy visiting the vatican and constantly dodging the advances of Pope JP. Very topical. As they say,
“These are not easy days to serve in the pastoral role that is mine”