Customer Reviews

Drill a Hole in That Substrate & Tell Me What You See

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On the cover of Jim White's latest album is the ghostly image of a man and a woman, faces close together, looking out from the shadows. The image recalls nothing so much as the art of the late Howard Finster, where fleeting yet ever present spirits flow in and out of this realm and another distant place and time, maybe even in and out of heaven itself.

Like fellow southerner Finster, Jim White's art is infused with the presence of God and Jesus, sin and redemption, and in Mr. White's case, also with the beauty and mystery of love. In White's world, love often comes with its cruel traveling companions, heartbreak and deep sorrow.

Several of the songs on "Drill a hole.." have been reworked into their current versions from having been played live in different incarnations over the last few years.

As with his previous two albums, this one can't be neatly pegged into any particular genre, but somehow, the different styles of the songs fit together much like individual pieces of a mosaic, ultimately forming a beautiful picture.

Co-produced by Joe Henry, this CD has a more jazzy overall feel than "The wrong eyed Jesus" and "No such place". "Combing my hair in a brand new style" and "Buzzards of love", both showcase a mindblowing horn section unlike anything on Mr. White's previous CDs, and while neither of these two is a short song by any means, both offer only a glimpse into the extended improvisations which might be possible if the band were unleashed on stage.

The opening track, "Static on the radio", with backing vocals by Aimee Mann, has an easy, laid back feel, is instantly accessible, and should be a hit on the radio if there were any justice in the world. "Bluebird" is a heartwrenchingly melancholic love song in which Mr. White tells of finding salvation in the eyes of his daughter. In "If Jesus drove a motor home" White gives us another installment of his humorous take on the Lord. The song is probably Mr. White's unique interpretation of John Lennon's "Imagine", and showcases the horn section.

"Objects in motion" is one of the songs which has evolved through years of playing it live, and is given the dreamiest treatment of the different moods permeating the album.

Jim White is unquestionably one of the best singer/songwriters/storytellers working today, and this is a must have CD from a one of a kind musician who is just hitting his stride.

Check out jimwhite dot net for more.

Jim White's South in its own dark way spins another yarn of wondrous stories where strung out Santa Clauses and Jesus listening to Dylan and driving a motorhome, are but only part of a lyric universe that owes as much to Country myths as to the ghost of Rimbaud.
Yes, this is another of White's "seasons in hell" more Texas, though, than nineteenth century France but probably as hallucinatory. These are tales of a man who, more than raised in America, has been abducted by it as it was an alien mothership.
For those who loved his first two albums, this one may not necessarily be that different, and what I said so far, not completely farfetched. This is not to say that this album lack musical surprises nor artistic growth, and Joe Henry's production has no small part of such accomplishment. Jim White can be dark all by himself but with Henry's aid gains a smokier, jazzier feel, which fits the songs like a silk glove.
In general, the tunes Joe Henry helmed as producer -which account for half the album- are the most interesting ones. I'd say that this is, in its own way, as inspired a collaboration as Loretta Lynn found with Jack White in Van Lear Rose. Of course, the music is far from similar but the producers' tugging and pushing an artist's certain style into new colors and atmospheres is comparable.
"Static In The Radio" -sung with Aimee Mann- and "Combing My Hair In A Brand New Style" are great examples of the musician-producer connection I've described, and so is "Buzzards of Love" with some powerful horns, somewhat reminiscent of Henry's own "Tiny Voices." And then there are three personal favorites of mine: "Bluebird," "That Girl from Brownsville Texas" and Phone Booth in Heaven" -stunning ballads all ... a weakness of mine- which are tender in their own wounded ways.
As White sings that a friend once told him ... "Jim, what you cling to, that's the thing that you had best forget. For ain't no rose bed ever gonna bloom in an untended field of regrets." Well, Jim White is definitely tending those regrets again and some glorious roses have begun to bloom.

no one (in recent memory) has explored the worlds of Greyhound Bus stations, small-town Southern preachers, passing trains and poetic trailerpark dream-state melodrama better than Jim White. (the usual) biblical references are present as are the ethereally whispered tales of bodies floating down rivers accompanied by misinterpreted radio broadcasts and birds perching quietly on telephone wires. this is a remarkable album from an artist that deserves MUCH more appreciation than he has received. fans of Jim White might note that this record has a bit LESS "hip/trip-hop" presence (in the production) and a displays a "jazzier/lounge" feel than NO SUCH PLACE. this is not a bad thing. it works VERY well for the songs on this recording.
"Static On The Radio", "Bluebird" and "Objects In Motion" are mesmerizingly gorgeous and the entire album is an absolute knock-out. EXCELLENT stuff and HIGHLY recommended. i give it TWO Stuckey's Pecan Logs UP!!!

Joe Henry knows a thing or three about shaping atmosphere and mood on his own discs, and his late-night approach, which recalls Daniel Lanois' gauzy yet ornate productions, creates just the right setting for Jim White's third album. White's always been a tough nut to crack - not a bad thing - and what would you expect from a Pentacostalist turned surfer turned fashion model turned Southern Gothic singer/songwriter? Not that "Drill a Hole" is a difficult listen - in fact it's frequently warm and tuneful even when it's a bit heebie-jeebie inducing. Aimee Mann backs him on opener "Static on the Radio," a tune that would be a hit on some alt-universe playlist. Admittedly, there's some peculiar stuff going on here - "Combing's" mutant funk, "Brownsville's" wistful waltz, "Jesus Drove a Motorhome's" wonked-out jazzedelia - but it all goes down as smooth as a whiskey neat. With his whispery voice miked so close that it sounds as though he's nestled against your eardrum, White relates tales of salvation and sin dipped in Faulkner's swampy mire. And like primordial ooze, his songs suck you in. Fall asleep to it and "Drill a Hole" may swallow you whole.

You can tell by the album's title that Jim White ain't your average guy. Also implied in that title is a hint of the literacy, imagination, and humor that lies within. We guess if you whittled White's music down to its core, you would label it `country'. But White is no purist and his music defies categorization. White draws pictures with words and brings them to life with his cinematic musical style. His choice of Joe Henry as producer is a natural as this cd is very much in a similar musical vein as Henry's own moody and edgy recordings (and quite unlike the Henry-produced, recent classic by Solomon Burke)-with its daring orchestration, ambient sounds and dreamy, druggy (think an extra swig of Robitussin) feel. White's hushed vocals sit atop the mix, intimate and mesmerizing. Although nothing that follows is as fully realized as the stunning and haunting opening duet with Aimee Mann, each subsequent track makes for, not only good listening, but a captivating read (as you follow along in your lyric booklet) as well.

A true story... one day, I noticed a cd sitting on my computer desk. It was this Jim White album. I'd never heard of Jim White, but I figured someone must have loaned it to me and I forgot about it. So I gave it a listen, and was blown away! Moody, mysterious songs, beautiful production, the sort of postmodern-exotic sound of a Luaka Bop release... it reminded me of many things, from Tom Waits to Chris Isaak to Brian Eno's 1970s pop albums.

So I started asking my friends to find out who loaned it to me. Nobody did. Nobody claims credit, or even knew who Jim White is.

That's it. I'm convinced this album actually has magic voodoo powers, and simply willed itself onto my desk because it knew how much I needed to hear this music.

This is my favorite album of 2004 (thank you NPR!). If I *had* to put this album in a genre, I guess I'd say blues, but it is so much more. The song lyrics are beautiful, literate, sad, intense, etc., and the music fits them perfectly. Listen to the samples - yes it's really true, ALL the songs on this album are great.

If you'll step into the Jim White cult, I think I can reliably assure you --- you'll be in good company, but no one you know will be there.

An easy guarantee: Very few people even know who Jim White is, much less what he does and how he does it.

To a degree, that's just fine for Jim White --- he seems to record more to find out what he thinks and feels than to delight an audience.

And yet, thanks to his checkered history, it's hard not to be interested in him.

White's family moved to Florida when he was a kid, and he turned Fundamentalist. But he "felt more and more lost as a result of trying to draw closer and closer to God," so in his mid-teens he started taking drugs. And then he became a fashion model. This often leads the young to doom, but not White: "At the age of 15, I had seen my friends turn into junkies and die, so it was no problem going into modeling and watching people doing cocaine and ecstasy and stuff, because I knew that they were just fooling themselves."

Later he became a world-class surfer. He cut off most of two fingers in a saw accident and learned to play guitar despite that. Studied film at New York University. Drove a cab. Moved back to Pensacola. Wrote some songs, made a movie about the South.

But what you most need to know about this singer-songwriter is that Jim White inhabits another reality. Or, as he says, as he hits his 50th year, "I have a mind like a child. I walk through the world with a fog behind me and a fog in front of me --- I can barely see where my foot lands."

So when it comes to his music, classify him unclassifiable. He's the country singer in the obligatory hat, only with a horn section behind him. He's the anti-commercial militant --- a lot of his songs are six minutes long --- who writes trance music you can't get out of your head.

Best, perhaps, to regard him as a thrillingly original poet, an eccentric guy in a '70 Impala who can be found at midnight driving down the back road, looking for freight trains and neon signs in the mist. There's a spoonful of William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor in the CD he tantalizingly calls "Drill a Hole in That Substrate and Tell Me What You See", but you'll also find characters from the Southern Gothic Carnival: preachers in smoky places, Madonnas in double-wides, coal miners, long distance bus passengers, barroom saints and sinners.

He not only sings about these people, he creates their context, As he does here, at the start of his best song, "Static On the Radio":

3 A.M. I'm awakened by a sweet summer rain...
distant howling of a passing southbound coal train.
Was I dreaming or was there someone just lying here beside me in this bed?
Am I hearing things? Or in the next room, did a long forgotten music box just start playing?

The music is foggy, distant, ghostly; you feel like you're on Quaaludes, in some ether where life and death just possibly merge. And then we discover this is a duet --- and the female singer is Aimee Mann:

And I know: It's a sin putting words in the mouths of the dead.
And I know: It's a crime to weave your wishes into what they said.
And I know: Only fools venture where them spirits tread.
`Cause I know: Every word, every sound bouncing `round my head
Is just static on the radio.
Everything I think I know is just static on the radio.

Spooky stuff. Late-evening music. Songs to play outside, or for friends at the end of the party, romantic sounds for nights when the windows's open and the rain dances on the street. Pretentious? Much less than you'd think. Most of these songs live off the cracked wisdom of the mythic South, some blow past tragedy and skid into humor ("If Jesus Drove a Motor Home"), none break the mood.

Don't get it? Wonder what I'm making such a fuss about? Scratch the itch of your curiosity. Dive in the pool and kiss someone underwater. Eavesdrop in the room where everyone's blind. Let your mind leap from the pine woods to the coal mine to the road house to the alley behind the church. And there, perhaps, you'll find the song behind the song, the rich vein of beauty lying on the far side of the static on the radio.

Yes, Jim White just might be that good.

Jim White ranges across a southern landscape littered with broken dreams and disappointed memories. The americana base of the music is coloured by all sorts of fringe genres. This album reminds me of the impact Beck's Odelay had when I first heard it. But where that album used sampling, White fully incorporates the rhythms and instrumentation of disparate styles into his arrangements. Bits of Bacharach, swampy funk, southern gospel, and desert musings (a la Giant Sand)all swell up out of the stew at some point or another. What makes this more than just a sum of influences is the constant vision of the lyrics. "It's a sin to put words in the mouths of the dead", "Dreams are just prayers without the put-on airs" and "Jesus drove a motor home" are amongst the observations of the real life of America White sees. Others write about White having a dark or pessimistic vision, but the detail here (matched by the layered production... you should listen to this on headphones, as well) is like a Walker Evans photograph. Tap into Jim White's southern gothic before it disappears and becomes iconic.

more adventuresome than your standard alt-country cd, this great recording has not a weak track on it. weirdly different in a perfectly listenable way, i have been enjoying this thing for a couple of years now, and am in no way ready to call it quits. highly, highly recommended.