Let's go backwards from there. Before ''I'm Slowly Turning Into You,'' you made ''The Hardest Button to Button.'' [Playing above.] That one got reproduced on The Simpsons.
Yeah, it's interesting — it seems that it belongs to ''culture'' now. That's quite flattering. I get a little frustrated 'cause I'm not asked [permission to use the concept], but on the other hand, I'm happy that it was reproduced this way.

Where did the idea come from?
Sometimes I use my ignorance of the English language. Until lately, I didn't understand the meaning of the song, and I was thinking about buttons on the amplifier. In French we say ''buttons'' for ''dials.'' And I was imagining all these amplifiers for some reason. The White Stripes are one of the only bands I like to feature playing their instruments, because it's so artistic the way they use them to articulate the rock. Rock music is completely obsolete for me now — it has no meaning as a rebellion. The meaning has completely vanished because it's an establishment. So people who make something new out of it impress me, and I think the White Stripes are one of the few who do this. They take the concept of rock 'n' roll and make it something avant-garde.

The red and black and white — I like the idea that they're out there with this concept they started 10 years ago, and they stick to it. It's very charming, and it's genuine. So they're the only people I don't mind to see performing. And since performance has been done many times, I try to find different ways to show it. And so this one — it's like each hit on the drum is engraved into space and time. So the time follows the beat, and the drum remains where it was at the time it was played. I guess that's how I get the concept. But it was funny, because we had to find 32 Ludwig drum kits.

Did you really? You didn't just move one each time?
No, there is no special effect. We had 32 amplifiers and 32 drum kits. Which was the fun part of the video. It would be really uninteresting to do it in post-production.

I think everyone assumed it was special effects. I had no idea.
No, we had a crew of people moving the drums and the amplifier and the microphone. Basically, we'd construct a row of the 32 drum kits, and we'd shoot the part of the song that attached to the segment, first with the [drum kit] line completed. Then we'd peel off the last layer of drums, and Meg would move backwards one kit, and as they were removing the drum kits, they were building up the next setup, 200 yards away. So we'd finish with this one, and the next would be ready to shoot on.

What did you do with the drums when you were finished?
We couldn't sell them, so we gave them to music schools.

NEXT PAGE: ''Denial Twist'': ''I think they had a good time [with Conan] — did they tell you they didn't have a good time?''

You Might Also Like

• Music News Jason Sudeikis' favorite songs
• Best & Worst 2007 The 10 best songs of 2007
• Music News The White Stripes are back | Whitney Pastorek
• Music News London Calling: Catch this week's indie-rock buzz from the U.K. | Mark Beaumont