February 2, 2011 – EDITOR'S NOTE: This story appeared in conjunction with SPIN's first cover story on the White Stripes, in October 2002. Back then, the band continued to give journalists (and fans) the run-around when it came to the question of whether Jack and Meg were siblings, ex-lovers, or something else. Here's what they told Chuck Klosterman on the matter. Sitting in a hotel room with the White Stripes and talking only about music is like sitting in a hotel room with O.J. Simpson and asking him only about winning the Heisman Trophy. At some point, every journalist is obligated to ask the payoff question: Are Jack and Meg White truly a brother-and-sister team (as they claim), or are they actually a divorced couple (as most of the planet now assumes)? What follows is the transcript of our conversation on that topic.

February 2, 2011 – [EDITOR'S NOTE, February 2, 2010: Because the White Stripes announced today that they are officially disbanding, we are republishing Chuck Klosterman's first interview with the band, which originally appeared in SPIN's October 2002 issue.] Jack White flicks his cigarette ash into a glass of water. He and Meg White are sitting on a couch in an überswanky hotel room in downtown Chicago, trying to explain how it feels to be a punkish underground band -- with modest sales and an antimedia aesthetic -- that has somehow become America's most frothed-over rock group. "We're in a weird spot right now," Jack says. "To be honest, I have a hard time finding a reason to be on the cover of SPIN. It was like being on the MTV Movie Awards [where they performed their recent single 'Fell in Love With a Girl']. You start asking yourself, 'What are we getting from this?

April 16, 2010 – JANUARY 18, 1994 Here's what really happened when MTV played Beck's "Loser" for the first time, in 1994: The culture inverted itself, weirdness was instantaneously mainstreamed, everyone stopped combing their hair, people slept more and purchased broken turn­­tables at stoop sales, dirtbags began using the word art in casual conversation, Michael Cera entered kindergarten. Here's what nobody said when MTV played "Loser" for the first time: "Well, I guess this is what we're doing now." Here's what everybody realized when MTV played "Loser" for the first time: Well, I guess this is what we're doing now. When a collective history of the 1990s is written (or, more likely, tweeted) in some distant future, all of the pop historians will mention the impact of "Smells Like Teen Spirit." That song will become the linchpin for whatever supposedly happened in that chasm between Gor

April 2, 2009 – In SPIN's April 2004 tribute issue to Kurt Cobain, then senior writer Chuck Klosterman posed a compelling and unique question: "What would have happened if Cobain lived?" Below, read Klosterman's theory about what the rock god's future could have held, had he not died 16 years ago. April 5, 1994: Kurt Cobain is admitted to the University of Washington Medical Center after surviving a massive heroin overdose. Discovered in a coma by private investigator Tom Grant, Cobain's near-lifeless body lay alongside a loaded shotgun and (what appeared to be) a suicide note.

July 1, 2005 – The Bravery are the most hated band in America. This does not mean they make terrible music (their debut received mostly positive reviews), nor does it mean they're unpopular (the album sold more than 50,000 copies in its first two weeks). Like Stone Temple Pilots, Third Eye Blind, and Matchbox Twenty before them, the Bravery serve as cultural shorthand: If someone wants to take a stand against inauthentic, unoriginal rock'n'roll, they can simply say, "I hate the Bravery." How this happened is unclear. Perhaps their inexplicable shout-outs to Fugazi (and their meticulously crafted eyeliner and thrift-store chic) make the Bravery seem a little too conscious of what's supposed to be cool. At May's Coachella Festival, attendees screamed insults at the band and competing acts supposedly picked fights with them. Anti-Bravery fliers have been posted around Manhattan's East Village.

December 10, 2004 – If you are the kind of person who talks about music too much, there aretwo words that undoubtedly play an integral role in your workadaylexicon: "overrated" and "underrated." This is because those twosentiments pop up in 90 percent of all musical discussions. What's interesting about this phenomenon is that no one uses the samecriteria when applying either of those terms. For example, bands can beoverrated because certain rock critics like them too much (Sonic Youth,Wilco, Yo La Tengo), or underrated if they sell a lot of records butaren't widely regarded as brilliant (Thin Lizzy, Duran Duran), orunderrated because barely anyone seems to know who they are (Tortoise,Sloan, Lifter Puller). Bands can be overrated because they'regood-looking (the Lemonheads in 1992), or they can be underratedbecause they're good-looking (the Lemonheads in 1994).

November 29, 2004 – "The job of art is to chase away ugliness," Bono says as he twists the ignition key of his Maserati Quattroporte. "So let's start with the roads. Cars are so ugly. America is supposedly the country that brought us the love of the automobile, yet they haven't produced a beautiful car in decades. Americans used to make feminine cars with a sense of humor, but now it's all SUVs. The Germans kind of picked up the slack for a while, but the Italians ultimately were the ones that took them on. But the Italians pick such arrogant names. Do you know what quattroporte means? Four-door. It means four-door." Bono laughs, and I pretend to understand why this is funny.

October 12, 2004 – The ThrillsLet's Bottle BohemiaVirgin The Thrills are a group of Irishmen obsessed with (a) Gram Parsons and(b) the alienating glamour of old California, which means they makemusic for people trying to drink themselves to death. The Thrills'second album, Let's Bottle Bohemia,doesn't top its predecessor. Like many second albums, it's basicallytwo good new songs packaged alongside some ideas left over from theprevious year. But there's still something profoundly likeable aboutthis kind of music, and it has to do with the way the album feels (asopposed to the way it sounds). The pianos feel sad. The guitars feelexhausted. Everything's loose, but hat premise may sound pedantic, andits profundity is mostly an extension of its simplicity.

September 20, 2004 – Now,I know what you're thinking; you're thinking, "I have already found theband of my dreams, and they are called Maroon 5." But try to thinkbeyond conventional reality. Everyone who likes music has probablyfantasized about their version of the perfect lineup for the perfectband. This is something people do when they are 14, or stoned, or 14and stoned. This is something I occasionally bring up to strangers incasual conversation, and I always expect them to dismiss the exerciseas a waste of time; to my surprise, they never do. Here's the idea: You must build the ideal rock band. Youneed a singer, a guitarist, a bass player, a drummer, and one "wildcard" (this musician can play whatever you choose and provide backingvocals).

August 30, 2004 – SalivaSurvival of the SickestIsland Breaking BenjaminWe Are Not AloneHollywood I'm not a musician, so (obviously) I'm not in a position togive advice to musicians. But I feel like I can make an exception withSaliva, a band that probably don't have a lot of professionalpretensions. And here's my advice: Make an instrumental album. Or analbum where all the lyrics are sung in a different language. Cantonese,perhaps. I realize that sounds vaguely insulting, especially sincevocalist Josey Scott is supposedly the "brains" of this outfit and thedriving force behind Survival of the Sickest. But the factremains: This album would be better without Scott screaming aboutabsolute nonsense.