AAA Backstage Archive

Jack White's Collaboration Woes

Jack White is no stranger when it comes to big collaborations. Having collaborated with the likes of Neil Young, Alicia Keys, The Rolling Stones and Loretta Lynn, it comes as a bit of a surprise that his efforts to collaborate with both Kanye West and Jay Z, have all failed to come to fruition

White was apparently left disappointed after Kanye West failed to follow up after he asked White to collaborate on Yeezus. Especially after describing his experience at the Yeezus Tour as possibly “…the greatest show I’ve ever seen in my life.” 

White also attempted to collaborate with Jay Z and the pair, "worked on several unfinished tracks" which never saw the light of day. "I'm not sure he liked them," White says. Despite announcing in 2010 that he'd done an "incredible" song with Jay, "I played him something that I've been kicking around for a while and he immediately came out with words for it. It's unbelievable-sounding.”

One artist White certainly won't be disappointed not to collaborate with any time soon is the Black Keys. After a series of emails were leaked last year divulging White’s personal accusations of The Black Keys copying him, and details of him trying to have his children removed from classes at the same Nashville private school attended by the kids of Keys' frontman Dan Auerbach. In a recent interview, Keys' drummer Patrick Carney remarked that White "obviously sounds like an asshole," in reference to the e-mails TMZ leaked from the rocker.

Whoever White is or isn’t collaborating with will not, however, dampen our excitement for White's second solo album, Lazaretto, which will be released on June 10th.