Wednesday, September 22nd 2010

News:  The White Stripes

Conan O’Brien On The Making Of The White Stripes’ Denial Twist

By Fernando Scoczynski Filho

It’s been more than two days since we posted something cool about Jack White, and the internet was already starting to feel all cold and murky as a result. Thankfully, a very healthy dose of White-related-awesome was recently delivered via YouTube, and we’ve got your fix.

Back in 2005, Jack’s then-main-act The White Stripes were pretty close friends with French director Michel Gondry. The music video extraordinaire had collaborated with the band 3 times, giving pretty awesome results, and was hired once again to direct the video for The Denial Twist. Michel, known for the crazy, “how the fuck did he do that?” type of special effects he puts into his videos, approached his fourth gig with the Stripes as an opportunity for a tour-de-force. The result was a mind-bending video that featured shots of the band in several kinds of distorted perspectives, where you weren’t really able to tell what was normal and what was over/undersized – not to mention a whole bunch of Conan O’Brien.

Here’s the finished product, the official Denial Twist video:

Now, after years of fond reminiscing, a making-of video has come to our attention. It gives out most of the secrets behind the special effects, and is pretty damn entertaining to watch. There’s midgets, giants, cars being cut in half, and Conan O’Brien. Watch it here:

Unfortunately, Mr. White and Mr. Gondry never worked together again after that video. The Stripes did write the song I’m Slowly Turning Into You (from the 2007 release Icky Thump) specifically based on a video treatment that Michel suggested to the band – but it never came to be. Legend has it that the director got mad when the band was featured on The Simpsons, in a segment that blatantly copied the director’s concept for The Hardest Button To Button video, without giving him any credit.

With any luck we’ll see a keeping of tradition when Conan returns to TV in November, and The White Stripes will help kick off King Ginger’s new project with an appearance. Here’s a taste of their history together:

Let’s Build A Home:

Conan’s final Tonight Show sendoff, We’re Going To Be Friends:

Guess we’ll just have to wait and see…