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Quoting widely from the box set insert about Live in Las Vegas backstory:

In the midst of the run of shows in September 2003, a promotional idea was cooked up by the team at V2 Records – 40 or so fans would be flown out to the White Stripes show at the Joint (at the Hard Rock Casino) in Las Vegas, get a meet-and-greet with the band, and then some time afterward be presented with a vinyl pressing of that evening’s show.

The original pressing is sparse to say the least. With no printed artwork, tracklisting or even credits “The White Stripes Live In Las Vegas” rubber-stamped on the labels is the only true identifier on this record. A dip through the original paperwork shows only 100 copies were ever pressed, all at United Record Pressing in Nashville.

Consider this snapshot of the night…Josh Hartnett, Steve Mcdonald, Darryl Hannah, Scott Caan and Josh Klinghoffer were all there, not necessarily together or gambling. Soledad Brothers and Whirlwind Heat tore it up as the opening bands, and the Stripes’ set itself was spectacular. The unpredictable moments electrify…an off-the-cuff take of Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away” to a mid-set abandonment of “Offend In Every Way” because of its reliance upon the D minor chord [ed: relevant because two months prior Jack White was in an accident that injured his hand and he was at that time unable to play D minor chords] and an opportune tease of “Mary Had A Little Lamb” imbue the evening with spontaneous joy. Songs from Elephant had taken shape as muscled, taut beasts of energy as the blasting jolt of pure rock and roll lava via “The Hardest Button To Button” testifies. All these factors make this night stick out as measurably better than the rest.

The White Stripes sound fantastic, of course, leading off with Meg’s gigantic sound on the opener “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground,” and continuing on through the million-song set (OK not quite but it’s a lot of tracks). Jack’s guitar work on “I Want to Be the Boy” is bendy beautiful and the rollicking southern blues guitar on Son House’s classic “Death Letter” is over-the-top fabulous. Plus we get the early teaser of the smash “Seven Nation Army” and a bunch of early-Stripes favorites like “You’re Pretty Good Looking,” “Hotel Yorba” and “Fell in Love with a Girl.” Can’t even imagine how amazing it must have been to be one of those 40 folks at the Hard Rock Casino, and did they even realize how lucky they were?

Not from the Vegas show (there isn’t anything out there on YouTube) but “Dead Leaves” from Coachella the same year:

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“A Tip From You to Me” appears on White’s 2022 album Entering Heaven Alive. It’s folky, with acoustic guitar and piano, a bit of country jangle and a mix of bright melody/harmony and some darker-edged minor chords. Side B has the demo version of “A Tip From You to Me.” It’s just Jack and an acoustic guitar so inherently more mellow and definitely sadder. I think I like the demo better than the album version.

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Olivia Jean “Raving Ghost” 2023. Third Man Records, limited edition Phantom Amethyst vinyl. We picked up this LP from Olivia Jean this past weekend when she played Bay View Bash in our neighborhood, though it was an extremely short set – 2 songs – as the heavens opened up with lightening and a torrential downpour. The bands gear was thoroughly soaked (and hopefully not ruined).

Today is an auspicious day to be writing about Olivia Jean’s third LP (besides having just seen her perform) – it’s the 35th anniversary of Enya’s album Watermark (released September 19th, 1988) that includes Enya’s hit song “Orinoco Flow (Sail Away)” which up until now I thought I could die happy NEVER hearing again (if you lived through 1988 or ever got a service at a day spa in the late 80’s/early 90’s you’ll understand). But Olivia Jean has made me fall in love with that song: her rendition of “Orinoco Flow” is a punky stomper and miles better than the original. The entirety of Raving Ghost is excellent spooky, slinky, surfy garage rocker. The single “Trouble” is unbelievably catchy, and I also love the creepy, crawly “Spider,” the Cramps-esque “Ditch” and the sultry bendy guitar on “Godmother” matched with Sabbath-level heaviness and Death Valley Girls-styled vocals is another standout.

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The Tulsa shows are blistering high energy with some covers and medleys sprinkled into the Raconteur mix. Some of my favorites include the little infusion of the Beatles’ “Blackbird” (with an endearing false-start) into “Top Yourself” from the 2008 Consolers of the Lonely and the songs “Gloria” and “I Want Candy” into “Hey Gyp (Dig the Slowness)” from the 2019 Help Us Stranger LP. Other top picks are “Help Me Stranger,” “Sunday Driver,” “Only Child” (all from Help Us Stranger), the frenetic and borderline bonkers “Salute Your Solution” (from Consolers) and “Steady As She Goes” (from the 2006 album Broken Boy Soldiers).

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Elephant is the band’s fourth LP and far and away their most successful as well as critically acclaimed. It’s included on many best-of-ever lists and won both the Best Alternative Music Album and Best Rock Song (“Seven Nation Army”) at the Grammy’s. It went to #6 in the US and to #1 in the UK. It’s totally digital/computer-free; the White Stripes recorded it with all pre-60’s gear onto an eight-track tape machine. For the most part it’s hard to tell but I can feel that old-school tech straining its edges on “There’s No Home for You Here” about which Jack White said they recorded “to see how far we could go with an eight track recorder, and I think how far we went is too far.” (I love it, though, it sounds like super-early Beatles or Stones).

They released four singles from Elephant. The first was the mega-power-hit “Seven Nation Army” which only went to #76 on the main US chart but hit #1 on the alternative charts in both the US and the UK. The track now an ubiquitous sports arena fav which is a bit of a head-scratcher to me, more for the genre it comes from than the song itself which is simple, rhythmic and primal aka perfect for sports. According to Wiki, “This phenomenon has its roots in a UEFA Champions League football match in Italy in October 2003, during which fans of Belgium’s Club Brugge KV began singing the riff in a game against Italy’s A.C. Milan. They continued the chant after Club Brugge KV striker Andrés Mendoza scored a goal. Club Brugge KV won the game, and the song subsequently became the team’s “unofficial sports anthem.” The second single was the cover of Burt Bacharach’s “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself” (first recorded in ’62 by Chuck Jackson and then, also in ’62, by Tommy Hunt, finally made popular by Dusty Springfield in ’64). The Stripes version went to #25 on the US indie chart. The third single from Elephant was “The Hardest Button to Button” (#8 US alternative, #23 regular UK chart, #1 UK indie) and the final single was the aforementioned “There’s No Home for You Here.” I love all the singles and my other top picks from Elephant include the hard bluesy rocker “Ball and Biscuit” (fun fact: a friend of ours named her catering company Ball and Biscuit a couple of years after this LP’s release and her business is still going strong), “The Air Near My Fingers,” and “Girl, You Have No Faith in Medicine,” a track that “was originally written for the band’s previous album, White Blood Cells, but Meg had disliked the song and it was removed. After debating it, the song was rerecorded and included in Elephant, but only after a line from the song was removed after it was deemed too harsh.” (wiki) Elephant does treat us to future-Jack White’s tendency towards bat-shit crazy, though, especially on the intro to the song “Little Acorns” (the rest of the song is pretty great though).

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I missed writing about this yesterday on its actual anniversary because my day was super-busy and any Third Man Vault package is a commitment. Live at the Detroit Institute of Arts is no exception. The two set performance consists of a whopping 33 songs, many from their 2001 LP White Blood Cells like my favorite “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground” plus other great tracks like “Hotel Yorba,” “Little Room” and “Fell in Love With a Girl.” They included songs from their earlier albums The White Stripes (“I Fought Piranhas” and the show closer “Screwdriver“) and De Stijl (“Hello Operator,” “Apple Blossom,” “You’re Pretty Good Looking For a Girl“). Some of the best moments are the sprinkles of Detroit-rock covers during the concert: Iggy Pop’s “I’m Bored,” The Gories “Omologato” and – best of the best – MC5’s “Looking at You.” While I’m not going to watch it today (that would be even more of a commitment than I can reasonably make though most of the tracks linked here are from the Institute Arts concert so I guess I’ve seen a bit of it already), the DVD has the same track listing so it will be a treat to get the full visual of this incredible performance – the venue is supposed to be stunning: a Beaux Arts-style visual arts museum; Jack White urged the audience to check out exhibits by Detroit artists during the intermission.

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White played a mix of solo, White Stripes and collaborative material. From his solo work, my favorites include “Hi-De-Ho” and “Taking Me Back” (both from Fear of the Dawn) and “That Black Bat Licorice” (from Lazaretto). From his work with Dead Weather he played “Cuts Like a Buffalo” and from Raconteurs “You Don’t Understand Me” and “Carolina Drama.” The White Stripes songs were of course my favorite: “Dead Leaves And The Dirty Ground” and an extra raucous “Fell In Love With a Girl” (both from White Blood Cells) and “Icky Thump.” Surprising to no one, well at least not me, the final encore was the White Stripes biggest song ever, “Seven Nation Army” (Elephant) which was fitting for the sports arena location.

This is usually the point in the post where I’d include some photos from the show. However, this was a phone-free event: our phones were placed in locked pouches upon arrival and we didn’t get access to them again until we were literally outside of the building. I was not happy and still am not but there’s some great photos of White’s set here but sadly none of Christreater (will happily update this post if anyone has any to send along).

White did play a couple of songs from Entering Heaven Alive: “A Tip From You to Me” and “Love Is Selfish.” As the record is really low key, folky and acoustic-ish, this also did not surprise me. The crowd – and White, I presume – wanted to rock. I prefer Jack White’s heavier rocking material as a whole but  Entering Heaven Alive is a good counterpoint that highlights his quieter songwriting abilities. My standouts include “A Tree on Fire From Within,” “Help Me Along” and “If I Die Tomorrow.” Entering Heaven Alive hit #9 in the US and #4 in the UK.

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