DAVID ALEXANDER Rome (2011 Japanese 15-track promotional sample CD album, picture sleeve booklet, obi-strip & sample stickered back insert. In a digital age where music is produced, consumed and discarded in the blink of an eye, 'Rome' is brilliant anachronism: a defiantly analogue album that took five years to perfect and has been made to pass the test of time. Brian Burton and Daniele Luppi met in Los Angeles in 2004, when Burton, better known as Danger Mouse, had just created amedia storm with 'The Grey Album' and Luppi, a composer from Italy, was receiving acclaim for his album 'An Italian Story', which revisited the cinematic sounds of his childhood. United by their shared passion for classic Italian film music, they decided to create something special. After an intense songwriting period – writing separately at first, and then together as the songs evolved – they travelled to Rome in October 2006. Luppi made some calls and they assembled the original musicians from films such as The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and Once Upon a Time in the West – including the legendary Marc 4 backing band and Alessandro Alessandroni's 'I Cantori Moderni' choir. Most of the musicians were in their seventies and hadn't worked together for several decades. The next step was finding two lead vocalists who could do justice to the songs [three of which been written for a man and three for a woman]. While on tour with Gnarls Barkley, Burton met Jack White of the White Stripes: 'I played him some of the tracks, not even thinking I'd be able to get him on it.' A year later, White recorded his contributions in Nashville. 'We thought it would be really interesting to combine his voice, which is very rock n' roll, with this polished and elegant music,' says Luppi. 'He nailed it perfectly.' White's counterpart, in a revelatory turn, is Norah Jones, who flew to Burton's LA studio from New York to sing on 'Season's Trees', 'Black' and 'Problem Queen'. 'I really love the way her voice sounds,' says Burton. 'I knew this was a little bit different for her, but she was really up for it.' TOCP-66991)