Fear Of The Dawn - Jack White: Review
Jack White
is one of the most admired and acclaimed voices in all of music. Over his 20 year career he's been involved in projects like The White Stripes, The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather. He also has a catalog of solo work and a robust discography behind the scenes as a producer, curator and as the founder of Third Man Records. Fear Of The Dawn is his 4th solo album and follows his most experimental project yet, Boarding House Reach in 2018.
Review By Lav
If you've known me for any amount of time there's a good chance you know how much I adore Jack White. He's one of the premiere guitar innovators ever really, and his musical footprint is visible in all kinds of different places throughout the industry. This means that he garners attention and varying level of appreciation from different fanbases in the music world. While his mainstream fans weren't crazy about his last record where he turned to much more experimental sonic elements, it attracted a whole new fanbase of critics and more abstract leaning rock fans. While I wasn't quite as high on Boarding House Reach as some critics I did enjoy it and I was anticipating this record quite a bit. All I can say is that if Boarding was a little bit outside the box for you, Fear Of Dawn might be a nonstarter because this thing gets insane.
If you've known me for any amount of time there's a good chance you know how much I adore Jack White. He's one of the premiere guitar innovators ever really, and his musical footprint is visible in all kinds of different places throughout the industry. This means that he garners attention and varying level of appreciation from different fanbases in the music world. While his mainstream fans weren't crazy about his last record where he turned to much more experimental sonic elements, it attracted a whole new fanbase of critics and more abstract leaning rock fans. While I wasn't quite as high on Boarding House Reach as some critics I did enjoy it and I was anticipating this record quite a bit. All I can say is that if Boarding was a little bit outside the box for you, Fear Of Dawn might be a nonstarter because this thing gets insane.
The record starts off with two of its singles and that's the most sane run it has. Taking Me Back has some ripping guitars and those trademark soaring Jack White melodies . I like the chugging heavily distorted riffs and been though the drums don't sound great there is a clear messiness to it all. While we're here I should say that as a big percussion dork the drums are messy and extremely clanky all over this record. While sometimes it fits in as an artistic choice like on the opener, it is also occasionally very annoying. Fear Of The Dawn is a short track that very prominently features some killer guitar soloing and a confident, intense sonic delivery throughout. Honestly given that it's just two minutes of sheer blasting, I've come around to it quite a bit.
From here on out and for most of the record the semblance of sanity has disappeared with occasionally great results. Eosophobia and its reprise later on the record both totally rule. While the chorus on the song proper is a bit flat at first with Jack just shouting out "it's coming up" back and forth between both audio channels. But the instrumentation behind it is pretty cool and it gets even wilder as the song goes on. I also think there's some really cool lyrics in the mix and both tracks just click with me. What's The Trick? feels like it actually channels the chaos into a cathartic release. It has layers of guitars rumbling in the background and Jack White delivering a half-rapped verse with some serious vitriol. It's an electric track that I like more and more every time I hear it.
Generally the last run of the record is less chaotic than the middle of it but there are still some songs I enjoy. That Was Then, This Is Now might be the song on the record that old Jack White fans vibe with the most. It has a classic rock kind of groove to it that isn't common in his music but I enjoy it. While some of the lyrics stand out for being kind of kooky I think they average out to about the right level for the song. I actually enjoyed the constant slowing down and speeding up of the instrumental more than I thought I would at first. Shedding My Velvet is more sonically reserved but only via comparison to the rest of the record. It has a thick groove, some infectious guitar riffs and a bouncy arrangement of keys that all adds up to an irresistible instrumental.
Sometimes the record really does confuse me and it took a number of drafts to cover some of these tracks. The White Raven is where the record starts to wander with some really choppy refrains and an increasingly crazy instrumental palette. At its core there are still some good Jack White fundamentals on display here though it incorporates all kinds of strangeness. The peak confusing moment is when the instrumentation fades out completely and a grand backing vocal line works its way in with these weird vocal effects going on. The song has good moments but it really depends on which section you're on.
Hi-De-Ho was a single that had a lot of people talking for a few reasons. It features Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest fame and it also uses a prominent sample of Cab Callaway's Hi-De-Ho Man. One weird thing it does is use this sample in basically the exact same way as the Jaden Smith song Icon which is a bit distracting but also not really that important. Q-Tip actually manages to fit in well on the song despite the vocal distortion he's layered in. It's Jack who manages to be far weirder delivering these strange and very distracting yelps in the background. If I heard this song in a dream I'm not sure I could describe it when I woke up, being able to listen to it more times hasn't yet helped.
Morning, Noon And Night has something to it instrumentally at least at first but the refrains don't hold up nearly as well. The mix of guitars and keys is okay but without a hook that really sells it there's only so high the song can reach. The weakest track of the bunch is Into The Twilight which is built around a Manhattan Transfer sample and some of the worst sounding drums on the record. It's really the point where the kooky randomness of it all really becomes a nonstarter and it's just all too much for me. Despite everything going on it never reaches that weirdly satisfactory level of discordance.
How can I even start to summarize Fear Of The Dawn. While it may not be the single most chaotic or versatile record I've ever heard by Jack White standards it might as well be. I'm not sure what kind of theme or sonic consistently the record was aiming for, or maybe it just used throwing everything at the wall as a concept. What is consistent is the raw instrumentation, though how I feel about it is much more inconsistent. Occasionally this is brash in a good way that feels uncompromising and so in the moment. Other times the clunkyness of the drums in particular makes enjoyment of anything else going on basically impossible. Given how cloudy my thoughts on the album are the conclusion shouldn't surprise you, this is inconsistent. Ultimately it really just comes down to execution where the record is made at least tolerable and delivers a marginal amount of quality mostly riding on Jack White's long history of musical creativity and innovation. 6/10
This cover is nice and stands out because of the color and quality of the drawing. The composition is intricate and doesn't have just one subject, which makes your eye bounce perfectly through the cover. It almost seems like a collage because of the way the aspects are layered. There is the chance to add in some personality with branding in the bottom left corner but it's pretty solid otherwise. 7/10
For more rock check out my review of PUP's The Unraveling Of PupTheBand here
