New White Stripes LP Writes Its Own Headlines

The White Stripes have announced a loosely approximate street date for their sixth full-length studio LP, entitled Icky Thump.

In a post on the band's website earlier this week, Jack and Meg announced their intention to release a future statement in which they will state, “we are doing our best (whatever that is) to release the album as soon as corporately possible.”

Recorded at Nashville’s Blackbird Studio, Icky Thump will include tracks “Little Cream Soda,” “Rag And Bone,” and “You Don’t Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You’re Told).” It will be released by Warner Bros., with whom the band recently signed a hefty recording contract.

From what we can tell, Icky Thump is derived from the Northern British slang term “ecky thump” which may or may not be a local term expressing surprise and awe doubling as a euphemism for a pastime involving barraging unsuspecting passersby with black pudding.

Whatever its etymology, the album has already proven its tendency to incite nearly universal blog item titles, as Wolf Notes pointed out this morning. Hopefully the album will rock as hard as the Stripes’ previous releases, lest we be subjected to an endless string of “Icky is Icky” jokes.

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