Well, we didn’t wind up seeing The Great Gatsby as planned, so this week of songs from the film’s soundtrack will have to survive without commentary about how each was used in the film (by me, anyway… several commenters have seen the film and can chime in on that front).
Today’s selection is a cover by Jack White of the U2 track ‘Love is Blindness.’ This is one of U2’s most portentous (and pretentious?) songs, closing the album Achtung Baby on an unsettling and somber note.
Another memorable Grammy performance came courtesy of Jack White, who released his first solo album early in 2012 after fronting what seems like a dozen different bands.
A solo Jack White album isn’t really as novel an idea as it might seem… pretty much everything he touches belongs to him, regardless of the other players. But the first single, ‘Love Interruption,’ has a really nice low-key, sultry vibe that sets it apart from much of his work.
To celebrate today’s release of Quantum of Solace, the latest James Bond film, I have selected as my Song of the Day its theme song, ‘Another Way to Die.’
The song was written by Jack White (of The White Stripes) and he performs it with talented singer-songwriter Alicia Keys. It’s the first duet in the Bond series’ history.
My favorite Bond song has to be ‘The Spy Who Loved Me,’ Carly Simon’s theme from the film of the same name, with Paul McCartney’s ‘Live and Let Die’ a close second. And of course I love to sing the chorus of Shirley Bassey’s entry in the series… “Gold-fingah!” And those who know about by infatuation with Shirley Manson of Garbage won’t be surprised to hear I’m a fan of their Bond song, ‘The World is Not Enough.’
Of all the unlikely pairings you can imagine, a few years ago Jack White and Loretta Lynn might have been near the top of the list. But White’s turn in Cold Mountain and some of the tracks on The White Stripes’ Get Behind Me Satan made it pretty clear that he has a real affection for country music.
He teamed up with the coal miner’s daughter on her Grammy-winning album Van Lear Rose, producing all the tracks, playing on many of them and singing co-lead on this one. He also inspired her to pick up a pen and write her own songs, something she’d never done before on a full album, with tremendous results.
Meet Me In Montauk 