To be a prolific artist doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re churning out masterpiece after masterpiece due to a
projectile stream of creative genius puke lining your porcelain bus. No. Ed Sheeran is a prolific artist. I’ll just leave it at that.
However, there is an exclusive cluster of prolific artists that meet once a year in a dug out crater beneath an eerie looking mountain who feast on the blood of Bruno Mars while chanting pelvic rhythms to their overlord, Dionysus. It’s true. Look it up.
These prolific artists are genius and partake heavily in this bizarre yearly ritual; Pablo Picasso, Billy Childish, William S. Burroughs, The Beatles circa 1966-67, Colonel Sanders, just to name a few. But there’s a new kid in town and already he’s beginning to ruffle the feathers of a few of the old breed, particularly Pablo who could be heard saying upon the latest recruits arrival, “Oh, for fuck’s sake, now there’ll be less Bruno blood for me.”
Jim White is his name, and man, this dude is prolific. Let’s go through the list:
Venom P. Stinger, The Dirty Three, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, PJ Harvey, Nina Nastasia, Xylouris White, Crime and the City Solution, Boxhead Ensemble, Low, Cat Power, Tex, Don & Charlie… and on and on it goes. Now, strapped firmly to the hairy back of the new kid in town is a brand new project, The Double. Teaming up with good buddy Emmett Kelly (The Cairo Gang, Ty Segall & the Muggers) and signing to killer Los Angeles label In the Red Records, White has unleashed an inner fury that has not been heard or witnessed since his seedy bar punk days with jazz fuck-ups Venom P. Stinger.
‘Dawn of the Double’ is incredible. One song. Forty minutes. The entire track hangs on a thread and feels like it could walk the plank at any second, resting on the laurels of a singular reverb drenched chord that dances with the whammy bar so inappropriately that you feel like a filthy voyeur just listening in. You sick pervert, you.
White’s drum track is nothing short of extraordinary. Really. It’s maniacal, yet rhythmic. Animalistic, yet organised. Slovenly, yet pretty damn neat.
Here’s what you do: Get yourself a 45 of Bo Diddley’s ‘Hey! Bo Diddley‘, bring it home and with a cigarette lighter just melt the underside a little. That’s it. Now, holding the record in both hands, simply press firmly on each edge so the whole thing warps. Then you must rewire your turntable so the disc rotates anti-clockwise. Play the record in reverse and on 33 1/3. Multiply by ten minutes and you got ‘Dawn of the Double’.
You know what might be easier? Just watch the damn YouTube clip below.
