Jack White
“Over and Over and Over”
limited edition one-sided tri-color, 200 something copies pressed, complete with custom picture sleeve that will be slightly different from the standard released version
Do you guys know how pumped I am?
For the record, I first heard this monster riff in 2005 at Jack’s house while he and Meg were recording “Get Behind Me Satan.”
I am pretty sure that the “Blue Orchid” riff pre-dates this one by a few days, but in my mind, they exist hand-in-hand. While “Blue Orchid” smashed that recording process wide open and gave Jack the inspiration to make that album as bad ass as possible, THIS riff, inarguably, is ten times stronger. I feel like Jack was originally calling it “Thermonuclear Counter-Thrust” but maybe I’m just imagining that. I can find no contemporaneous documentation of that name.
There are two takes of demo recordings of this song from 2005 (with the riff played solely on fuzz bass). There are demo recordings from 2007 with the White Stripes trying it in rehearsal leading up to the tracking of the “Icky Thump” album. Imagine the guitar profile more in line with the octave-pedaled presence of the song “Icky Thump” and that’s a good start for understanding the 2007 version. I guess the Raconteurs tried it but I never heard any evidence, same with the Dead Weather. It was apparently the main track that Jack and Jay-Z worked on together in 2009, under the title “Ray Bans” or “Behind My Ray Bans” and although I’ve never heard that working, I’m told to imagine the phrase “Behind my Ray Bans” to coincide with the last five notes of the riff.
As Jack has already said, this had been his white whale. We sincerely considered including the ’07 demo as part of the “Icky Thump X” Vault package last year. I have no recollection of Jack ever previously giving me such an impassioned plea…”I just really think we shouldn’t put this on the Vault” he said. My response was pretty matter-of-factly, “Well, it’s your label, so please don’t feel like you have to convince me.” Maybe he was trying to convince himself?
Regardless, at the end of 2017 when Jack finally had played me this version you hear now, upon the end of the song, I looked at him and said “I’ve been waiting twelve years to hear this song with lyrics.”
The final version of this song is everything I’d ever dreamed it would be. It is my favorite moment on the album, with the coda to “Humoresque” being a close second. I cannot wait to see this monster unleashed unto a sell-out crowd at Little Caesar’s Arena, a stone’s throw away from the Gold Dollar where this whole mess got started.
I’ve got an extra copy of this limited tri-color to give away here. AUTOGRAPHED by Jack White, today, explicitly for this purpose. Don’t use my give-away here as an excuse to miss going to any number of the listening parties we’re throwing at record stores worldwide though. Even though we’re giving away tri-colors at the listening parties, none of those will be autographed. Man we spoil you kids.
As for the giveaway, post a comment, can be about whatever, but maybe talk about a significant wait you’ve endured in life. Can be funny, pithy, in iambic pentameter, whatever. The “best” comment will be solely determined by me. Please chime in by noon central time on Tuesday, March 13th.
***WINNER HAS BEEN CONTACTED***
I’ve been waiting 21 years to hear a riff as sexy as “Over and Over and Over”. And now that I have heard it I can officially say “worth it”.
My wife and I waited 2.5 years for our little boy Henry. Well worth the wait!!
Waiting.
To feel like I’ve done enough.
To feel like I can stop, now.
Pushing, walking. Fighting, fleeing. Trying, breathing. Raging, seething. Living, dying.
Scorned. Forlorned.
And waiting.
Isn’t it all just an absurd game.
I just really like music. I really enjoy reading about Jack’s process of creating and his sense of awe when it comes to bringing music into existence.
I was 16 when Jack White III came to Pittsburgh in 2014. I didnt go to the concert. About 2 weeks after the concert is when I started listening to Jack and the White Stripes. I instantly became a fan and looked online to see if he was touring. When I found out that I just missed him, I thought, "well shit; Ill just wait for the next time he comes around. Now it’s 2018 and I see Jack is touring again so I quickly snatch up some tickets for Cleveland since Pittsburgh wasnt one of the dates. Two weeks later, it’s announced that Pittsburgh is added to ine of his dates. I just thought to myself, “well shit, I guess I gotta see him twice!”
I Remember seeing the Fell In Love With a Girl vídeo in Nickelodeon back when I was 10 years old. I sincerely thought The White Stripes were an animated band because they also showed Gorillaz videos in Nickelodeon. I asked my mother for a White Stripes CD and she told me that they didn’t arrive to Mexico, which I still think it was a lie, particularly because, two years later, I got an Elephant CD from a big chain record store the same week I heard Seven Nation Army. Not many bands came to Mexico City back then because there were not many festivals, but the ones that did come were big rock or pop bands, which back then I really enjoyed. The only one that was missing was, of course, The White Stripes. It seemed strange to me because bands that were played that much on radio were always coming to Mexico to promote their album, which I thought the White Stripes would do. That didn’t happen, until two years later, when the band played the Palacio de los Deportes in 2005. I thought they were still promoting Elephant and was convinced the Marimba onstage was a tribute to Mexico which, I found out at the concert, had many many White Stripes fans! I eventually outgrew my Las Rayas Blancas shirt, but still treasure the only time I saw the White Stripes live. I’m very sure that waiting for them those four years was worst than it could be now that every band comes to Mexico City yearly to its big festivals, but I’m sure no other concert can top the amazement and mystique I felt when I saw the White Stripes, not an animated band as I thought, for the first and last time.
Bonnaroo 2008…is probably the most significant wait of my life. At least, the wait I remember the most. It was my second Roo with my girlfriend and we had taken a healthy dose
of mushrooms 30 minutes prior to Kanye’s “scheduled” performance.
This did not go as planned.
Time ticked on, the main stage would show an updated start time and jeers would ensue. The crowd became more and more agitated and in turn my partner in crime became more apprehensive.
With every new start time, there was more fury and surely what I thought would be a fire soon enough…perhaps a good ol’ garbage can one. Plenty were being knocked over and mounted as is.
It was a prolific smattering of general drunkedness with inklings of debauchery towards any and all inanimate objects.
She decided, after the second or third “start time”, it would be best if she just tried to sleep…amazingly she fell into quite quickly. As she was slumbering I began to crossover. I have no idea how long I sat on the grass, behind the soundboard, with her head in my lap but according to reports on the internet, I must have sat there, holding her, for 3 hours.
Sometime after 4am she looked up at me and said…“I’m going to be really sick.”
We made our way to the line of porta pots which had no line for themselves and she proceeeded to get the demons out. At some point, during all of this…Kanye hit the stage and the first few notes of “Good Morning” dropped. Upon hearing this, the door to the porta flung open and out walked, no…jumped, my girlfriend with the wildest eyes and craziest smile I have ever witnessed on a human being. With a loud “Good morning!” at the top of her lungs, she broke into a full sprint for the stage.
We stayed for the whole set that eventually rolled into the daylight. It felt like a whole day had passed. You would think that this was the end of that story…but it wasn’t. Stories never end when you run into a Wook on the way back to camp who offers you a pull from his plastic gallon milk jug that looks like it’s filled with water that steeped a whole pack of cigarettes and has “SPECIAL K BREW” in Sharpie scrawled across it.
I never even asked what was in it when I took a huge swig but it was met with raucous applause from the Wook clan. I’m pretty sure that jug was filled with Ketamine and the subsequent hours that followed proved this to be true. (Oh and it said “K-Brew” of which my then booming brain made no correlation.)
Some people say that show was bunk but I don’t remember it that way. When I was there, what I saw was very different.
I saw Kanye make the sun rise.
Worth the wait.
To quote Jack “music is sacred” and without a doubt, the music of Jack White communicates a higher message. His music has changed my life and woke me up when I had fallen asleep. In my mid-30s with children, I thought the time of music affecting me had passed. Fortunately, seeing Jack in Columbia, S.C. inspired me to find myself again. To write, create, find purpose, soul, and paint, all while showing my children that you don’t have to give up the things you love and are passionate about just because you are a parent. You can do it all. It is hard and exhausting at times, but the work is worth it. Having an inspiring soul touching kick-ass soundtrack to get you through the days and keep you inspired is something to always be thankful for.
I was a newbie at a labouring job, and my boss thought it would be funny to send me looking for “a long weight (wait)”. Not experienced enough to know I was being fooled, that was a god damn long wait.
I waited once for my life to get going, and now it’s almost over. Now I wait, until the end. Forever and ever, amen.