Jack White – No Phones, No Filters, Just Rock ’n’ Roll At Eventim Apollo
- Alan Bryce
- 15 hours ago
- 5 min read
Jack White – Eventim Apollo - 25th August 2026
WORDS ALAN BRYCE
The first thing that struck me at Jack White's Eventim Apollo show wasn't the sound.
It was what wasn't there.
This was one of White's phone-free shows, meaning every mobile device was sealed away before anyone entered the auditorium. At first it felt odd. We've become so conditioned to having our phones within arm's reach that spending two hours without one creates a low-level anxiety, a vague sensation that you've forgotten something important. But once the music started, something else happened. For the first time in a very long time, I found myself watching a concert without a forest of screens between me and the stage.
No glowing rectangles.
No crowds filming every song.
Just people looking forward.
It's remarkable how unusual that feels now.
Before White arrived, support act RIP Magic took the stage and set about establishing a mood entirely their own. Armed largely with bass, drums and a handful of synthesizers, they built their songs from repetition, atmosphere and texture rather than hooks. It wasn't the easiest set in the world to immediately connect with, and there were moments when the audience seemed unsure whether to stand back and absorb it or wait for something more direct to emerge.
But that uncertainty was part of the appeal. RIP Magic aren't interested in instant gratification. Their music unfolds slowly, often circling the same ideas until subtle shifts start to reveal themselves. At times it felt hypnotic, at others a little elusive. An acquired taste, certainly, but one that rewarded patience. In a live music landscape increasingly built around immediate impact, there was something admirable about a band willing to let a room come to them rather than the other way around.
Then Jack White walked onstage and the atmosphere changed instantly.
White remains one of the few genuinely unpredictable figures left in mainstream rock. Plenty of artists have eccentricities; White has built an entire career around following whatever strange musical impulse happens to be rattling around inside his head that particular evening. Watching him perform is like watching somebody simultaneously constructing and demolishing a building. Every riff sounds as though it's being wrestled into existence.
The set began with an Intro Jam before crashing headlong into "That's How I'm Feeling", immediately establishing the night's theme: movement. This wasn't going to be a greatest-hits revue. It was going to be a journey through the various corners of White's restless musical imagination.
The emotional centre of the evening arrived just a few songs in.
"Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground" exploded into life, every bit as ragged and urgent as it was when The White Stripes first unleashed it. Then, midway through the song, White did something unexpected. The band eased into Dolly Parton's "Jolene."
News of Parton's death had broken only hours earlier.
The room immediately understood what was happening.
For a few minutes the concert ceased being a concert. White wasn't reinterpreting the song or trying to make it his own. He seemed simply to be acknowledging the loss of one of America's great songwriters. The choice itself felt perfect. "Jolene" has become one of those rare songs that transcends genre entirely, belonging to everybody while remaining unmistakably Dolly's.
When White steered the band back into a reprise of "Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground," the song carried a different weight. The transition wasn't slick or rehearsed. It felt spontaneous, emotional and deeply human. The kind of moment that can only happen in a live room and can never really be recreated afterwards.
The middle section of the set was a reminder that White's musical universe extends far beyond The White Stripes. Newer cuts like "Old Scratch Blues," "G.O.D. and the Broken Ribs" and "Derecho Demonico" sat comfortably alongside older material and deep-rooted influences. "My Bucket's Got a Hole in It" arrived straight from Hank Williams country, while "Neighbors Blues" and "Delta Bound" revealed White's enduring fascination with the foundations of American music.
What makes White so compelling is that he never treats these influences as museum pieces. For him, blues, country, garage rock and modern noise all exist in the same moment. The songs don't feel curated. They feel lived in.
The White Stripes material landed particularly hard. "Cannon" remains one of the most gloriously primitive things White ever wrote, while "The Union Forever" still sounds wonderfully strange all these years later. These songs haven't aged because they never belonged to any particular era in the first place.
The encore pushed things into another gear.
An Encore Jam quickly detonated into "Icky Thump," one of the great controlled explosions in White's catalogue. "I Fought Piranhas" sounded as wild and unstable as ever, while "It's Rough on Rats (If You're Asking)" and "There's Nobody There" showcased White's knack for making modern rock songs feel simultaneously ancient and futuristic.
Then came "Archbishop Harold Holmes," that gloriously odd recent addition to the catalogue. By the time "Steady, As She Goes" arrived, the Apollo was singing along as one, before White closed the night with the inevitable "Seven Nation Army."
It's easy to forget how powerful that song is because it's become part of popular culture itself. It no longer feels like a song so much as a piece of public property. Football crowds borrowed it. Advertisers borrowed it. The whole world borrowed it.
But hearing it performed by the man who wrote it is a useful reminder that beneath all that baggage lies one of the most irresistible riffs ever committed to tape. The thing simply conquers everything in its path.
When the lights came up, people began unlocking their pouches. Screens flickered back to life. Notifications returned. The modern world slowly reassembled itself.
The spell broke.
But for a little over two hours inside the Eventim Apollo, Jack White achieved something increasingly rare. He held a room's attention completely. Not because phones weren't allowed, but because he gave people something better to look at.
The setlist wandered through White Stripes classics, Raconteurs favourites, blues excavations, country standards and new material with the confidence of someone who still views rock and roll as a living thing rather than a catalogue to be preserved. The impromptu tribute to Dolly Parton gave the night genuine emotional resonance. And the phone-free policy, initially awkward and faintly uncomfortable, ended up feeling like an unexpected gift.
By the end of the night I realised I hadn't missed my phone once.
I was too busy watching the show.
SET LIST
Intro Jam
That’s How I’m Feeling
Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground (The White Stripes song)
Jolene (Dolly Parton cover)
Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground – reprise (The White Stripes cover)
Old Scratch Blues
My Bucket’s Got a Hole In It (Hank Williams cover)
Love Interruption
Broken Boy Soldier (The Raconteurs song)
I Need Love (Acoustic song, each lyric starting ‘I need love when…’)
Neighbors Blues
Delta Bound (Roseta Howard & The Harlem Hamfats cover)
Underground (Shortened version)
Cannon (The White Stripes song)
The Union Fever (The White Stripes song)
G.O.D and the Broken Ribs
Derecho Demonico
ENCORE
Encore Jam
Icky Thump (The White Stripes song)
It’s Rough on Rats (If You’re Asking)
(Unknown)
I Fought Piranhas (The White Stripes song)
There’s Nobody There
Archbishop Harold Holmes
Steady, as She Goes (The Raconteurs song)
Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes song)
CONNECT JACK WITE
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