Rarebird's Rock and Roll Nest

Last week I received the twentieth set of exclusive vinyl items offered to Platinum members of Third Man Records’ Vault service. For those who are unaware, Third Man Records is the label owned by Jack White, who is the leader of the White Stripes, the Raconteurs, and the Dead Weather, and is now a solo artist as well. The Vault service promises to deliver exclusive vinyl-only records (one full-length album and one 7” single) to its Platinum members every three months. According to the postal service, my package was sent on June 2nd. I received it on the 4th. This twentieth set of items includes a vinyl LP edition of White’s 2014 studio album Lazaretto , a 7-inch single containing demo versions of two of its tracks, and a bonus book to supplement the album. First of all, I want to say that I was very excited to receive this package six days before the album’s official release date of June 10th. The album came with a download card so that the member could obtain mp3’s of the tracks,...

What was the first punk rock song? This is a hard question to answer, because there is much debate about where and when punk rock began. Many people hold the belief that the punk rock movement was born in June of 1976 when the Sex Pistols played a legendary "gig that changed the world" in Manchester. Others will argue that the movement's real beginnings stretch back to the late '60's, when such artists as the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, and the MC5 paved the way for future innovators and troublemakers who thumbed their noses at fashion. And others will say that punk rock's seeds were planted a few years earlier still, by the '60's garage-rock bands whose songs were compiled on the Nuggets compilations. In fact, the liner notes written for the original Nuggets double-LP released by Elektra in 1972 contained what is believed to be the first known use of the term "punk-rock". Those notes were written by music-critic-turned-musician Len...