DavesMusicDatabase.com is devoted to ranking, rating, and reviewing music of all genres and eras. The DMDB blog serves up album and song reviews, best-of lists, music history snapshots, and music-related essays.
Rock singer and guitarist Jack White was born John Anthony Gillis on 7/9/1975 in Detroit, Michigan. He first made his name with ex-wife Meg White in the White Stripes, one of the prominent garage rock revival bands of the early 21st century. He went on to form the Raconteurs and the The Dead Weather before starting his solo career.
Check out the Dave’s Music Database podcast The Best of Jack White, 1997-2022 based on this list. Debut: July 26, 2022, at 7pm CST. New episodes based on Dave’s Music Database lists are posted every Tuesday at 7pm CST.
Awards:
Top 50 Songs
Dave’s Music Database lists are determined by song’s appearances on best-of lists as well as chart success, sales, radio airplay, streaming, and awards. Songs which hit #1 on various charts are noted. (Click for codes to singles charts.)
2. Fell in Love with a Girl (The White Stripes, 2001)
DMDB Top 10%:
3. Steady, As She Goes (The Raconteurs, 2006)
4. Icky Thump (The White Stripes, 2007)
5. Blue Orchid (The White Stripes, 2005)
6. Hotel Yorba (The White Stripes, 2001)
7. My Doorbell (The White Stripes, 2005)
8. Dead Leaves on the Dirty Ground (The White Stripes, 2001)
9. Hardest Button to Button (The White Stripes, 2003)
10. Sixteen Saltines (Jack White, 2012)
DMDB Top 20%:
11. Lazaretto (Jack White, 2014)
12. Love Interruption (Jack White, 2012)
13. Portland, Oregon (Loretta Lynn with Jack White, 2004)
14. I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself (The White Stripes, 2003)
15. We’re Going to Be Friends (The White Stripes, 2001)
16. You Don’t Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You’re Told) (The White Stripes, 2007)
17. Conquest (The White Stripes, 2007)
18. Ball and Biscuit (The White Stripes, 2003)
19. The Denial Twist (The White Stripes, 2005)
20. I’m Shakin’ (Jack White, 2012)
21. Jolene (The White Stripes, 2000)
22. Level (The Raconteurs, 2006)
23. Salute Your Salution (The Raconteurs, 2008)
24. Two Against One (Danger Mouse with Jack White, 2011)
25. Another Way to Die (Jack White with Alicia Keys, 2008)
Beyond the DMDB Top 20%:
26. Connected by Love (Jack White, 2018)
27. Hello Operator (The White Stripes, 2000)
28. Help Me Stranger (The Raconteurs, 2019)
29. The Big Three Killed My Baby (The White Stripes, 1999)
30. Over and Over and Over (Jack White, 2018)
31. Many Shades of Black (The Raconteurs, 2008)
32. I Cut Like a Buffalo (The Dead Weather, 2009)
33. Die by the Drop (The Dead Weather, 2010)
34. Hands (The Raconteurs, 2006)
35. Freedom at 21 (Jack White, 2012)
36. Love Is Selfish (Jack White, 2022)
37. Now That You’re Gone (The Raconteurs, 2018)
38. Would You Fight for My Love? (Jack White, 2014)
39. Treat Me Like Your Mother (The Dead Weather, 2009)
40. Old Enough (The Raconteurs, 2008)
41. I Feel Love (Every Million Miles) (The Dead Weather, 2015)
42. Love Is Blindness (Jack White, 2011)
43. Taking Me Back (Jack White, 2021)
44. I'm Finding It Harder to Be a Gentleman (The White Stripes, 2001)
45. There’s No Home for You Here (The White Stripes, 2003)
46. Let’s Shake Hands (The White Stripes, 1998)
47. Black Math (The White Stripes, 2003)
48. Hypocritical Kiss (Jack White, 2012)
49. You Are the Sunshine of My Life (Jack White & the Electric Mayhem, 2016)
50. One More Cup of Coffee (The White Stripes, 1999)
Jack White, one of today’s most celebrated musicians, is set to accomplish something this week he couldn’t do with his groups The White Stripes, The Raconteurs, or Dead Weather – land a #1 album on Billboard with his first solo effort, Blunderbuss. White got his start with the 1999 release of The White Stripes, a roots-oriented duo comprised of himself on guitar and vocals and his ex-wife Meg White on drums. De Stijl followed in 2000. Neither charted in the U.S. or U.K.
With high expectations, Jack and Meg delivered an even more acclaimed and commercially successful follow-up with 2003’s Elephant. It was Jack’s first visit to the top ten in the U.S. and in the UK it was not only The White Stripes’ first charting album, but went to #1. It also is the best-selling title of White’s catalog with more than 5 million sales worldwide. Like its predecessor, it also ranks in the DMDB’s top 1000 albums of all time and one of the
top 100 albums of the 2000s. It was also named Album of the Year by Mojo, NME, Q, and Spin magazines.
In between those albums, White formed another band, The Raconteurs, with The Greenhornes’ Jack Lawrence and Patrick Keeler as well as solo artist Brendan Benson. That group released two albums – 2006’s Broken Boy Soldiers and 2008’s Consolers of the Lonely. Both were top ten albums in the U.S. and U.K.
The Dead Weather, image from last.fm
Not content to limit his resume to two groups, White also formed The Dead Weather. Lawrence came along from The Raconteurs and Dean Fertita, guitarist and keyboardist for Queens of the Stone Age, entered the picture. White actually took a back seat as the drummer and put The Kills’ Alison Mosshart up front. That group also released two albums – 2009’s Horehound and 2010’s Sea of Cowards. Both were top ten albums in the U.S., but neither made the top ten in the U.K.
Outside of his group projects, White contributed five solo cuts to the Cold Mountain soundtrack in 2003. That same year, he was rumored to have collaborated with Electric Six on the songs “Danger! High Voltage” and “Gay Bar.” In 2008, he and Alicia Keys dueted on “Another Way to Die,” the theme song for the James Bond film Quantum of Solace. In 2009, he released his first official solo single “Fly Farm Blues,” which was written and recorded in 10 minutes during the filming of the documentary It Might Get Loud which featured White alongside Jimmy Page and The Edge discussing guitar. In 2010, White contributed vocals to three tracks for Danger Mouse’s Rome album.
Now, in 2012, White releases his first full-fledged solo album. Blunderbuss dropped on April 24, 2012. White wrote, recorded, and produced the entire album. January 30 saw the release of the album’s first single, “Love Interruption.” The second single, “Sixteen Saltines,” was released on March 13.
