If you’ve been following the music gossip columns of late, you’ll be aware that old mate Jack White has called out The Black Keys for copying him. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone he called them the musical equivalent of kids at school who dress like everyone else because they don’t know how to be original by themselves and also said “I’ll hear TV commercials where the music’s ripping off sounds of mine, to the point I think it’s me,” he said “Half the time, it’s The Black Keys.”
He also had a dig at Adele & Lana Del Ray, saying they were biting the late Amy Winehouse’s style and even fellow White Striper Meg White copped some harsh words.
After the interview came out, Jack issued a lengthy apology and explanation via an open letter on his website where he generated extra press around his new record apologised to everyone he’d had a dig at. “God bless the Black Keys, Danger Mouse, Adele, Meg White, and anyone else I’ve spoken about, and thank you for understanding. Good fortune to all of them, and I’m sorry for my statements hurting anyone.”
Jack White has without a doubt been one of the most talented and creative musical minds doing the rounds over the past decade and a half but we decided to dig around and find 5 lots of people who could call out Jack himself for a spot of plagiarism…
1. Greg Cartwright & Jon Spencer
It sounds like Jack heard this first:
or was it this?
And is it just us or does the Raconteurs classic Broken Boy Soldiers sound a lot like Led Zeppelin?
2. “Bad Tempered” Billy Childish
Last word to Billy …. “P.S. I always stay well within the music industries recommended guidelines of never plagiarising more than 50% of my material. But no matter who my influences may be, I would never stoop so low as to rip off Led Zeppelin”
3. Edward Scissorhands
4. Blind Willie Mctell, all other Blind jazzmen, Son House, and well all other Bluesmen really
V.
Now “reworked” for 3 Women from Lazaretto (due any day)
5. Piet Mondrian and all the De Stijl Art Movement
So there you have it. Also, we already knew the Keys like a cunning steal. After all we put together a whole album of their naughtiness here:
And loved how it sounded. And that was even before they bit the Mar-Keys “The Great Memphis Sound” for their “Turn Blue” sleeve art.
But really Jack? Don’t you protest too much? Popular music is full of “rhymin’ and stealin’” (as another group of arch thieves once put it) and all the better for it. But to claim they rip YOUR style? Really? We don’t think it makes it any better just because you tell everyone who you stole from!! It’s still stealing! The collision of influences and creation is just A COOL ACCIDENT!
Let’s leave it with Jack’s own words from I Want To Be the Boy To Warm Your Mother’s Heart:
“It feels like everything I say is a lie.”
