Is it even Glastonbury if Jack White doesn’t make an appearance somewhere? I’ve seen him duet sultrily with Alison Mosshart in the Dead Weather, he played here twice with the White Stripes and once with the Raconteurs, he’s guest-appeared on other people’s stages, and played his own eclectic solo sets to appreciative rockers. This year he turned up at the Park stage for a secret set – though, as ever, it was an open secret. By the time the soundcheck was emitting random blasts of synthesised organ in advance of his appearance – there was a statue on stage which may well have been of him, I wouldn’t be surprised – the massed crowds were so formidable that they had to close the area. Those who made it up the hill found that it was worth the trek, though. White delivered an hour of face-melting rock delirium with barely a break between songs.
When he runs on stage – blue hair, blue guitar, pale make-up – he roars straight into the fat opening notes of Taking Me Back, opener to this year’s album Fear of the Dawn. I wondered if the set would consist mostly of that record’s mildly deranged circus-rock but it encompasses killer songs from his entire career, and he has a lot of them. The next song is Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground from the White Stripes era, then it’s straight into Love Interruption, from 2012: “I want love to change my friends to enemies, show me how it’s all my fault.” The transitions are seamless, each song devolving into noise and wild guitar soloing from White before he breaks out the next huge riff. His guitar screams and crunches, the bass rattles ribcages, the drums thunder – for the first few songs the crowd seems almost stunned by the noise.
