Barely in Control

Little Willie John recorded I’m Shakin’ in 1960, and the song lived in that specific rockabilly pocket for decades until Jack White put his version on Blunderbuss in 2012. White’s take is barely controlled—the whole thing sounds perpetually on the verge of coming apart, which is exactly where rockabilly lives when it’s working. He sounds unhinged in the best possible way, like a man who could compose himself if he chose to but has made a deliberate decision not to. The song is about nerves and desire and the body betraying you before you can stop it, and White understands all of that somewhere deep. One of the best things he’s recorded.