here they are:
"High Ball Stepper" by Jack White: If you thought the experimental days of rock music were over, think again!! "High Ball Stepper" has a crackly blues sound like most Jack White songs, but it also repeatedly fades in and out, has a minimalist one chord vamp throughout, has a random piano solo during certain points of the song, and (get this) NO LYRICS!! I believe this is the very first instrumental track I've ever reviewed on this blog!! The video for the song (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRbnAxrS3EM) is also rather avant-garde! I guess you could say that this is more white noise than it is White Stripes!!
"Red Eyes" by The War on Drugs: Considering that The War On Drugs' first big song, "Brothers", was basically a Bob Dylan soundalike, it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that their next musical emulation is towards Bruce Springsteen, a musician who was initially hailed as the "new Dylan" when he debuted! However, this suggests more of the "gothic Springsteen" sound that groups like The Killers, The National, and Arcade Fire have attempted. Even the lyrics here are somewhat Springsteen-ian, such as "come and ride away" and "surrounded by the night and you don't grow old", both of which are reminiscent of The Boss's romanticism of city life. I guess it's only a matter of time until The War on Drugs do a musical ode to Mark Knopfler from Dire Straits!!
"You Move Me" by Robert Cray: It's hard to believe that a man who revived the blues-rock sound in the mid-'80s is still making music today, but he is, and he's pretty good at it too! Using mainly an F sharp minor chord vamp, briefly accompanied by some blues-y 7 chords, "You Move Me" doesn't need to do much to prove its point. Blues-y subject matter here, too, about Robert basically being a fool who is helplessly in love with someone. Plenty of blazing hot guitar licks over the main chord to keep you on your toes!
