The Daily Swarm

If one rocker hits the sweet spot consistently, it’s Jack White, whose songs tend to have the perfect combination of muscle, melody and grit. I’ve put his White Stripes songs up against the deep stoner churn of Cannibal Ox and the West Coast funk of Lyics Born, and they’ve delivered. (I’ll confess that I didn’t use a Raconteurs song in 2006 or 2008. Maybe I thought it would be too obvious.)

In the process of thinking about this year’s mix, I’ve realized that nothing from White hits that sweet spot harder than his latest project, The Dead Weather (with The Kills’ Alison Mosshart, the Raconteurs’ Jack Lawrence and Queens of the Stone Age’s Dean Fertita). Considering White’s comments about hip-hop over the years — he’s an eternal skeptic — I’m not going to argue that the band’s debut, Horehound, is a response or a reaction to the overall sonic primacy of hip-hop. (White doesn’t pick culture battles; he just makes records.) Nonetheless, Horehound is a reminder of hard rock’s status as one of the ancient building blocks of hip-hop. White forgoes his guitar to play drums and produce the songs — and his models, for the most part, are the boom of Black Sabbath and the bap of Led Zeppelin. It’s ruggedly funky stuff, with full-footed bass-pedal work and deliberate snare hits. And it sounds absolutely great on my iPod next to this year’s Raekwon, MF Doom, Mos Def and Diamond District albums, or whatever hip-hop single might pop up.