Double listening for upcoming “best of the decade” posts has slowed down my 2009 intake, but this year is coming together, helped by one old reliable in new form and two other old reliables hitting new peaks.
Horehound — Dead Weather (Third Man): Jack White is certainly one of the decade’s signature musicians, but though his arresting guitar-tunes are a given, the quality and specificity of his songwriting — and songcraft — comes and goes. Befitting the old-fashioned guy that he is, his music has been most interesting when he’s in the thrall of a female muse — Meg on the breakout White Blood Cells (he pines for her “pretty voice,” but she’ll only agree to keep the beat), redhead paramours going and coming on the underrated Get Behind Me Satan, a luminous Loretta Lynn on the White-produced Van Lear Rose. On this worthy side project, White retreats behind the drum kit, lets one of his ladyfriends (the Kills’ Alison Mosshart) take the lead, and the result works as music-first not only better than the boy’s-club Raconteurs, but also better than even the White Stripes. The songs on Horehound don’t quite stick, but the sound — darker and thicker than White’s other projects — overcomes: Punk-blues, low-key Led Zep, and — shockingly, considering the source — tinges of rap-rock all collide in a homebrew that swaggers, coos, and pounds in all the right spots. (“Treat Me Like Your Mother,” “60 Feet Tall,” “Bone House”)
Grade: A-
