Danger Mouse is at it again, working on a new project (on top of producing U2’s next studio album) teaming up with Italian composer Daniele Luppi on a new project called Rome, bringing in Jack White and Norah Jones.
Inspired by 1960’s spaghetti western soundtracks, it turns out the project has been in the works for over five years, having been recorded in three separate sessions in Rome, and featuring some of the musicians behind the aforementioned soundtracks. Speak in an interview with The Guardian Danger Mouse said of working with White that “for the lead vocalists, I definitely wanted a man and a woman. The female vocal needed to be soft, not polarizing. But the male needed to have a bit more angst to it. I played some of the music for Jack White when I was on tour shortly after doing the first session, just to show him what I was doing, because at the time everyone thought I was just a hip-hop guy, or whatever. He liked it, but at the time I wasn’t even thinking of using him – you know, it’s Jack White. But in the end, I thought, he’s really into it – why not? We all understood that if it didn’t work, it didn’t work. But he tried it in different voices – a high voice, a low voice, and I thought, why don’t we leave them all in? And it sounded great. There’s a bunch of his vocals on “Rose With the Broken Neck”, and it doesn’t always sound like him – sometimes you’re like, is that Jack or not?”
“It’s a dark vibe,” he went on to say, “melancholic, a little foggy… I get a lot of offers to do film soundtracks and I’ve never said yes, because no one has heard this yet, and I think some people still think of me as a hip-hop producer. But this is what I would actually do, if I were to make a soundtrack. I’m really happy it’s out.”
The end result reflects “love, death, happiness – the visceral connection of man and women,” he said, but with no release date set, we’ll just have to wait and see.
