See also: - Meg Bio & - Jack Bio

Group members: Jack White (John Anthony Gillis) and Meg White (Megan Martha White)

Formed: 1997 in Detroit, Michigan.

Genre/Styles: Rock, Garage Rock, Punk Blues and Blues-rock.

Influenced by: The Sonics, Robert Johnson, Son House, Captain Beefheart, Loretta Lynn, The Monks, The Rats, Bob Dylan, The Gories, The Stooges, The Gun Club, The Troggs, The Flatduo Jets, Cole Porter, The Yardbirds, Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps, Blind Willie Johnson, Tampa Red, Irvingberlin, The Velvet Underground, Hank Williams.

Albuns: The White Stripes (1999), De Stijl (2000), White Blood Cells (2001), Elephant (2003), Get Behind Me Satan (2005) and 'Icky Thump' (2007).

Biography: Wikipedia

The White Stripes formed in a Detroit, Michigan suburb in 1997, first performing publicly on July 14. The duo began receiving more attention after Jack White's unceremonious exit from the Detroit garage-rock band The Go in 1999 after serving as their lead guitarist on their first album Whatcha Doin'. Jack has described their eponymous debut album, The White Stripes (1999), as "really angry ... the most raw, the most powerful, and the most Detroit-sounding record we've made."

Their second release, De Stijl (2000), was named after the De Stijl (The Style) Dutch art movement, which they cited as a source for the approach to their musical image. De Stijl art is on the album cover. The work was recorded on an 8-track analog tape in Jack's living room; he subsequently said that he would never again employ that method because of the many interruptions which were encountered.

The White Stripes enjoyed their first significant success during 2001 with the release of their first major label album White Blood Cells, initially released on Sympathy for the Record Industry; the album was re-released on V2 Records in 2002. The stripped-down garage rock sound drew critical acclaim in the UK, and in the United States soon afterward, making The White Stripes one of the more acclaimed bands of 2002. In 2002, Q magazine named The White Stripes as one of "50 Bands to See Before You Die". The Lego-themed video, directed by Michel Gondry, for the single "Fell in Love with a Girl" off White Blood Cells brought them wider attention.

Their follow-up album Elephant (2003), was inspired by Alexander "the strings" Levi after being one of Jack's inspirations as a child. It was recorded with Liam Watson at Toe Rag Studios, London. The album was released to widespread critical acclaim and even more commercial success, as it became The White Stripes' first UK chart-topper and US Top 10 album. The album's first single, "Seven Nation Army", was the band's most successful yet, and was followed with a cover of "I Just Don't Know What to Do with Myself", written by Burt Bacharach. The album's third single was the quite successful "The Hardest Button to Button". On February 8, 2004, the album won a Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album, while "Seven Nation Army" won a Grammy for Best Rock Song.

In 2003, Jack and Meg White appeared in Jim Jarmusch's film Coffee and Cigarettes in a segment entitled "Jack Shows Meg His Tesla Coil". This particular segment contains extensions of White Stripes motifs such as childhood innocence and Nikola Tesla. In 2004, the band released its first music film Under Blackpool Lights, which was filmed entirely using 16mm film and was directed by Dick Carruthers.

The group's, Get Behind Me Satan, was recorded in Jack White's Detroit home and released in North America on June 7, 2005 and has garnered critical acclaim. Three singles were released from the album, the first being "Blue Orchid", a popular song on satellite radio and some FM stations. White's new spouse appears in the video for the song, and the second single was "My Doorbell". The album won Best Alternative Music Album at the 2006 Grammy Awards. They were also nominated for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal for the song "My Doorbell".

The band released a cover version of Tegan and Sara's song "Walking with a Ghost" on iTunes on November 14, 2005. The song was later released on December 7, 2005 as the Walking with a Ghost EP featuring four other live tracks.

The White Stripes postponed the Japanese leg of their world tour after Jack strained his vocal cords, with doctors recommending that Jack not sing or talk for two weeks. After a full recovery, he returned to the stage in Auckland, New Zealand to headline the Big Day Out tour.

The Raconteurs, fronted by Jack White and Brendan Benson, released their debut album Broken Boy Soldiers in May 2006. White went on to tour with the band through the rest of the year.

In October 2006, it was announced on the official White Stripes website that there would be an album of avant-garde orchestral recordings consisting of past music written by Jack White called Aluminium. The album was made available for pre-order on November 6, 2006 to great demand from the band's fans; the LP version of the project sold out in a little under a day. The project was conceived by Richard Russell, founder of XL Recordings, who co-produced the album with Joby Talbot. It was recorded between August 2005 and February 2006 at Intimate Studios in Wapping, London using an orchestra. The album is available exclusively through the Aluminium website as a numbered limited edition of 3,333 CDs with 999 LPs also produced but now sold out. The download format will not be limited, and will come with an electronic booklet.

On January 12, 2007, it was announced that in the process of reconstruction, V2 Records would no longer release new White Stripes material, leaving the band without a label. However, the band's contract with V2 had already expired, and on February 12, 2007, it was confirmed that the band had signed a single album deal with Warner Bros. Records.

On February 28, 2007, in an online post spuriously attributed to "Kitayna Ireyna Tatanya Kerenska Alisof of the Moscow Bugle" (a reference to Batman: The Movie), the band announced that they had completed work on their studio album entitled Icky Thump. The album was recorded at Nashville's Blackbird Studio and took almost three weeks to record — the longest of any White Stripes album to date. It would also be the first album with a title track. The album was released on June 16 in Australia, June 18 in New Zealand, the UK and Europe and June 19, 2007 in the United States, Southeast Asia, and Japan. The release came on the heels of a series of concerts in Europe and one in North America.

Three tracks were previewed to NME: "Icky Thump", "You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You're Told)" and "Conquest". NME described the tracks as "an experimental, heavy sounding 70's riff," "a strong, melodic love song" and "an unexpected mix of big guitars and a bold horn section," respectively. The first single from the album, the title track "Icky Thump", was made available online through the iTunes music stores in the United States and Canada on Thursday, April 26, 2007, while it became available in the United Kingdom on June 4. On the US Billboard Charts dated May 12, 2007, "Icky Thump" became the band's first top 40 single, charting at #26, and later charted at #2 in the UK charts.

On September 11, 2007 the White Stripes announced the cancellation of 18 tour dates due to Meg's suffering from "acute anxiety" problems. Following this, on September 12, 2007, a pornographic video surfaced that was rumored to be a sex tape featuring Meg White, but this was subsequently denied. In an allegedly unrelated occurrence, that same day, the duo cancelled the remainder of their 2007 tour dates including their scheduled tour of the UK.