Song of the Day: The Dead Weather - I Feel Love (Every Million Miles)

Every Monday through Friday, we deliver a different song as part our Song of the Day podcast subscription. This podcast features exclusive KEXP in-studio performances, unreleased songs, and recordings from independent artists that our DJs think you should hear. Today’s song, featured on the Midday Show with Cheryl Waters, is “Boys Life” by The Dead Weather from the 2015 album Dodge & Burn on Third Man Records.

The Dead Weather - I Feel Love (Every Million Miles) (MP3)

Jack White's blazing blues rock project with Jack Lawrence, Dean Fertita, and the inimitable Alison Mosshart began as an impromptu jam, but The Dead Weather quickly became the dirtiest, grimiest, and most ferocious of the Nashville musician's myriad projects. Formed when the four musicians took part in a Nashville studio in January 2009, the band's first recordings inspired them to put other projects (The Kills, The Raconteurs, and a then-active The White Stripes among them) on hold while they toured and recorded two albums: 2009's Horehound and 2010's Sea of Cowards. After the touring cycle for the latter album ended, the group returned to other projects until 2013, when they began what would become sporadic sessions for their third album, which was released partially across 7"s before arriving in full this fall as Dodge and Burn.

Despite being recorded in chunks and over two years (as opposed to the quick recording process of the prior two albums), Dodge and Burn is just as mean and relentless as anything else in the band's catalog, and "I Feel Love (Every Million Miles)" is no exception. Playing strictly to their strengths – White holds down a loose rhythm, Fertita winds a wiry, distorted guitar lick over Lawrence's low-end punch, and Mosshart wails like she's trying to exorcise the devil by drowning him in Jack Daniels – the band roars for three muscular minutes, never letting up in the least until they hit a final home note and let the feedback wash out the rest of the song. The song is no doubt squarely in the band's stylistic pocket, but when you can pump out razor-sharp blues burners like "I Feel Love (Every Million Miles)" on the regular, there's no reason why you shouldn't.

Due to the members' other projects and Jack White's hiatus from live performing, The Dead Weather have announced that there will be no tour behind Dodge and Burn. You should still keep up with the band at their website and Facebook, and watch the video for "I Feel Love (Every Million Miles)" below.