Jack White’s favourite guitarist of all time: “The ultimate expression”
It’s probably not an overstatement to suggest that Jack White is the last truly great guitar hero we’ve seen.
Of course, plenty will soon follow, but White, both with his various bands, The White Stripes, Raconteurs and Dead Weather, as well as his solo work, has achieved the position through a range of searing solos, undeniably raucous riffs and a guttural tone that feels as close to a Detroit piston initiating a pig’s squeal.
Not just a guitarist, the singer-songwriter has made a steadfast career away from simply wielding his axe in the right way. But, in his heart, we’d imagine that White would call himself a guitarist first and foremost. But he isn’t an egotistical nightmare of a performer, he knew that without the forebearers of the instrument, he would never have achieved the grandeur of guitar he now has.
White is a modern guitarist with an old-school mindset, and nobody has influenced him more than Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page. At every opportunity, White talks up Page’s ethereal ability and, for The Whites Stripes founder, there’s no other artist that he finds more inspiring.
White is more than happy to spend his time debating the impact of Led Zeppelin, who he called “an immovable force in music”. For further insight into White’s total adoration of the English rockers, he once revealed: “I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t like them,” which indisputably spells out just how highly he holds the group. White also praised the innovators by saying: “A great Zeppelin track is every bit as intense and spontaneous as a Blind Willie Johnson recording”.
With that, White has also had the honour of playing alongside Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, but unfortunately for White, they were on separate occasions. When he headlined Lollapalooza Argentina in 2015, White took to the stage after Robert Plant & The Sensational Shapeshifters, and it was befitting he was joined by Plant to perform a cover of Zeppelin’s ‘The Lemon Song’. For one night only, White got to step into his hero’s shoes and cosplay as Jimmy Page.
Over the years, Jack White has acknowledged Led Zeppelin’s influence on his career several times. In Jimmy Page’s biography Light and Shade, he noted: “What was interesting about Led Zeppelin was how well they were able to update and capture the essence of the scary part of the blues”.
There isn’t a Zeppelin creation that White doesn’t love, but if he had to pick a favourite, it would be ‘Whole Lotta Love’. Moreover, he boldly claimed Page’s work on the track is the greatest in rock ‘n’ roll history. “I still think that break is probably some of the greatest guitar notes ever played, if not the greatest,” White said in Led Zeppelin: The Oral History of the World’s Greatest Rock Band about the track.
White gave his all to try and understand the mechanics of the track, “I rewound it so many times that there was a fuck up on the tape before the guitar solo. Just that little section is so powerful, and it was powerful to me when I was five years old”.
White continued: “At a time when everyone thought the blues had been taken to its highest, hardest-hitting point, it turned out to not be the case. Page came along with Led Zeppelin and turned it up ten more notches… Led Zeppelin is the ultimate expression of the power of the blues”.
Jimmy Page concocted a blueprint that White has re-interpreted in his own style. His love of the Englishman is particularly evident in solo offerings such as ‘Blunderbuss’ and ‘High Ball Stepper’.
Watch the bucket-list moment below for White when he was taught how to play the Led Zeppelin classic ‘Kashmir’.
