The Blues is the truth

Jack White via Anothermag.com

The Blues is the truth.
I think people have a funny notion about the truth and authenticity. People are very easily distracted. A lot of people looked at The White Stripes, the colours we wore 

and the way we presented ourselves and didn’t understand what we had to do with the blues. A lot of people thought we were taking the piss.

 They weren’t able to see through [our appearance]. 

And to me that is the ultimate test – if you can’t pass that then go away!

If a 15-year-old kid asks me, ‘What way do you like to listen to music?’ I say, ‘Listen to it on vinyl...
put the headphones on or sit in a room with your friends. Put the needle down.’ There is a tangible experience going on there, a romantic experience 

where it’s reverential to the music, the artist and, most of all, the song. iPods, iTunes and downloads aren’t reverential. They’re just easy. 

And I understand that – I own an iPod too, you know.

 But as far as reverence goes I can’t say in good faith, ‘Let’s abandon physical formats and move to the invisible age.’ It’s just not magic. 

How great that last year was the biggest vinyl-selling year in a decade.

I hate words like ‘retro’, ‘recreate’ and ‘relic’ – all the ‘re’ words – 

I hope none of them are on my tombstone or in a paragraph about me. 
I have always been trying to find out what is romantic about music and art and the best way to record it 

and present it to people. And sometimes the new way of doing it is not the right way.
 It’s not about looking back and emulating something from the past but staying 

with the things that make the most sense and pushing forward with them.