“It’s a bizarre one,” Jack White has promised of his next album, Boarding House Reach, and now he’s released a teaser video that, if nothing else, confirms that assessment. Titled “Servings and Portions from my Boarding House Reach,” it’s a wild collage recording accompanied by studio photos (though none of White himself), inexplicable images, and bits of animation – an appropriate visual complement to the audio, which veers from one song excerpt to the next with the help of fuzz, noise, and interference. Check it out:
Taken on its own, it sounds like White doing a “Revolution #9” cover, but rest assured, this isn’t intended to be a stand-alone recording – just a sampler from the new record, White’s first solo album since 2014’s Lazaretto. He mentioned Boarding House Reach (whose title, by the way, comes from the old expression for one’s ability to reach across a crowded table, such as that at a boarding house, to get the best portions) during his keynote speech at the Detroit “Making Vinyl” event last month, explaining, “I’ve just got to let it settle. I need to listen to it by myself. I haven’t been able to listen to it by myself for awhile.”
White has not yet set a release date for the album.