Several private comments made by Jack White to ex-wife Karen Elson in a heated run of emails surfaced in 2013, with White lamenting that The Black Keys were riding his coattails to stardom. In his cover story for Rolling Stone, White finally explains his thoughts behind the comments, though anyone expecting a retraction will be sorely disappointed.
Update (5/30): Jack has issued an apology and explanation. Read here.
Keys drummer Patrick Carney reacted to the e-mails in the May 22nd issue of Rolling Stone, saying that, while he thought White “sounds like an asshole,” he had sympathy for the strenuous situation Jack was in when he wrote them. As Carney put it: “We’ve all said fucked-up shit in private, and divorce is hard.”
While that may have been the end of it, Jack clarified his thoughts on the Black Keys, in bitingly unmerciful fasion.
“There are kids at school who dress like everybody else, because they don’t know what to do,” he explains, “and there are musicians like that, too. I’ll hear TV commercials where the music’s ripping off sounds of mine, to the point I think it’s me. Half the time, it’s the Black Keys,” White says. “The other half, it’s a sound-alike song because they couldn’t license one of mine. There’s a whole world that’s totally fine with the watered-down version of the original.”
He continues:
“Some people will hear that and say ‘Oh, Jack White thinks he’s the first person to play the blues.’ But certain acts open up a market for a certain style. Amy Winehouse: Did she invent white soul? Wearing a beehive? No. But she did something brand new and fresh, altogether as a package, and you see who’s in her wake, from the Duffys to the Lana Del Reys,” he says. “Adele selling 20 million records? That would not have happened if Amy Winehouse was alive. The White Stripes did the same thing, and in our absence, you’re gonna find someone to fill that. And you get a band like the Black Keys, who said they never heard of the White Stripes? Sure.”
Nashville’s feeling pretty chilly these days.
