Jack White has announced his second solo album. Lazaretto, the follow-up to 2012's Blunderbuss, will be released through White's Third Man Records on 9 June.
Unlike Blunderbuss, which White issued as several special packages, Lazaretto will get only one limited-edition treatment. Available only to subscribers of Third Man's Vault series – and only for people who subscribe before 30 April – the deluxe Lazaretto comes on split-colour blue-and-white vinyl, with a poster, a "linen, letter-pressed postcard", a 7in of two demos, and what press materials describe as a "lavish" hardbound 40-page book.
This summer, White is scheduled to appear at several North American music festivals, including Bonnaroo and New York's Governors Ball. He will continue to release twin-track singles with the group the Dead Weather and is reportedly to appear on Neil Young's upcoming covers album, A Letter Home.
Blunderbuss debuted at No 1 in the UK, spending 14 years on the album chart.
On Tuesday White gave an unusual first taste of the music to come: High Ball Stepper, released as a YouTube video, is a four-minute instrumental track with growling and reversed guitars, chewy distortion, and nary a single lyric. It recalls Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix and perhaps even Battles. White hasn't said if the rest of Lazaretto will be instrumental.
The album's lead track will be released later this month. "[The new album's] not one sound, it’s definitely several," White told Rolling Stone last year. "I don't pick my style and then write a song. I just write whatever comes out of me …"
VIA theguardian