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'SNL': Jack White pays tribute to Eddie Van Halen, wins fans over with White Stripes and Beyoncé medley

Jack White – known for fronting bands The White Stripes, The Raconteurs & The Dead Weather – also covered Blind Willie Johnson's blues classic 'Jesus is Coming Soon'

Jack White, the musical guest for the latest episode of 'Saturday Night Live', dominated the late-night comedy show with his powerful and timely performances that expressed fears and uncertainty surrounding the coronavirus pandemic. White – best known for fronting the bands The White Stripes, The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather, and for his solo releases – covered Blind Willie Johnson's 1928 blues classic 'Jesus is Coming Soon', a song about the 1918 Spanish Flu. Mashing it up with his 2003 blues-rock track 'Ball and Biscuit', taken from The White Stripes' fourth studio album 'Elephant', White sang: "The noble said to the people / Close your public schools / Until death passes you by you better close all your churches too / I'm done talkin. Yes I'm walkin' / God is coming soon / The great disease was mighty and people were sick everywhere / It was an epidemic and it traveled through the air."

Filmmaker Kevin Smith tweeted a video of the performance of 'Ball and Biscuit' with the caption, "Jack White shredding 'Ball and Biscuit' on SNL tonight. This man is a gift, that is all."

The 45-year-old singer-guitarist also incorporated into the performance his Beyoncé collaboration 'Don't Hurt Yourself' from the album 'Lemonade' as he sang the chorus: "When you hurt me, you hurt yourself / Don't hurt yourself / When you love me, you love yourself." Next, for his second set, White closed out the show with an energized performance of 'Lazaretto' off his second solo album of the same name. White dedicated this performance to Eddie Van Halen – the iconic guitarist who recently passed away from throat cancer at the age of 65 – by using a cobalt blue guitar that Van Halen had designed for White. The show also featured a short clip of Van Halen's 'Saturday Night Live' performance from February 1987 and host Bill Burr ended the show by saying "rest in peace, Eddie Van Halen."

White earlier wrote on Instagram that he'd be honoring Van Halen saying, "I thought it could be a nice gesture for me to use this blue Eddie Van Halen model guitar for one of the songs tonight on SNL. Eddie was very kind to me and saw to it that this guitar was made for me to my specs. I wont even insult the man’s talent by trying to play one of his songs tonight. Thanks again Eddie for this guitar and rest in peace sir."

Reactions

One fan of the guitarist rhetorically asked, "Did Jack White just fold Blind Willie Johnson's 'Jesus is Coming Soon' about the 1918 flu into 'Ball and Biscuit'?" while another impressed fan tweeted, "Whoa – Jack White just went off on 'SNL' with a 2020 re-write of 'Ball and Biscuit' and ferocious performance just now. Thank you for bringing the rock Jack!"

A different fan, talking about the excitement to watch White perform, said, "Confession: I've been lurking around NBC YouTube channel waiting for this. Brilliant and grand to see Jack White playing live," while another fan, calling it the greatest 'SNL' musical performance ever, wrote "Jack White on three days notice is better than some people’s full year of planning. That might have been the greatest performance on #SNL I have ever seen." Sharing similar sentiments, another Twitter user and fan of 'Ball and Biscuit', expressed, "Wow! Jack White just played one of my favorite White Stripes songs 'Ball and Biscuit' on SNL. I love Meg, but the drummer on this performance was amazing! The way he had his drums set up tilted forward facing away from him...never seen that before!"

White was announced as the musical guest on 'SNL' by executive producer Lorne Michaels after country singer Morgan Wallen was disinvited over violating Covid-19 protocols.