Eddie Van Halen – Showbams

Jack White shows his SoCal fans why he’s Hall of Fame material with sold-out performances at Hollywood Palladium & Santa Barbara Bowl

Jack White at Hollywood Palladium

Photos courtesy of Jack White // Written by Josh Herwitt //

Jack White //
Hollywood Palladium & Santa Barbara Bowl – Los Angeles & Santa Barbara
May 12th-13th & 15th, 2025 //

If you talk to most people across the music industry and those who follow music, you won’t hear a lot of reverence for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

Even after being established more than 40 years ago, it has about as much clout as the Grammys do these days and let’s be honest … that’s not saying much.

But every once and a while the RRHOF nominating committee gets it right, and this year’s induction of The White Stripes felt appropriate along with Soundgarden and OutKast (we know what you’re thinking, but the latter actually is far from being the first hop-hop act to earn the honor).

The gritty, bluesy garage rock that poured out of Detroit natives Jack White (guitar, keyboards, piano, vocals) and Meg White (drums, percussion, vocals) in the late 90’s and early 2000’s until their parting was unlike anything anyone had heard and seen at that time from only two rock musicians — let alone two who were married to each other for the band’s first few years but publicly presented themselves as siblings before eventually divorcing — playing their respective instruments.

And although he won’t publicly admit this, much of that had to do ultimately with Jack’s creativity and virtuosity as a guitarist. His distinct and unmistakable style that’s often highlighted by his high-pitched, screeching solos has propelled him into elite company with other legendary six-stringers like the late Jimi Hendrix and Eddie Van Halen or the great Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton.

Since the Stripes called it quits back in 2011 and Meg decided to put down the sticks for good, Jack has continued writing music at a prolific rate as a solo artist first and foremost but also for his other projects that include The Raconteurs and supergroup The Dead Weather with Alison Mosshart of The Kills.

Jack White at Santa Barbara Bowl

His sixth solo album No Name, which was surprise released last summer and initially distributed in the form of a free 12-inch vinyl with all purchases made at any Third Man Records location, ranked as one of our favorites in 2024 (see our picks here) and was named in several other “Best of 2024” lists.

Nevertheless, we would have to wait more than six months after first hearing the new material to catch Jack and his new cast of sidekicks in Southern California. Missing out on tickets for his album release shows in more intimate settings such as Lodge Room and The Mayan in October, our next opportunity to see him in the flesh came early this year thanks to the annual NAMM Show in Anaheim. It was on a rainy Saturday night in late January that we saw White perform about half of the songs from No Name during a sold-out gig he announced at the Grove of Anaheim and sold tickets for just a few days prior.

With shows on his “No Name Tour” already booked in LA and Santa Barbara this spring, it was a little surprising to see Jack book another one in SoCal ahead of those dates, but that’s what one of the last remaining guitar heroes continues to do more than three decades into his career whether he’s making new music or playing live: surprise.

The support for this tour has followed very much in the same vein, with Jack selecting a local band from each city he visits and revealing who it will be with only hours to go before showtime. That’s not why we spent two straight nights at the Hollywood Palladium as we did three years ago at LA’s YouTube Theater (read our show review here) — or at the Shrine Auditorium in 2012 — and embarked on another trek up the coast to the Santa Barbara Bowl after witnessing Jack’s debut there in 2018 for his third studio effort Boarding House Reach (read our show review here), however.

A lot has changed for Mr. White since those tours. Outside of bassist Dominic Davis, his backing band has been turned over with Patrick Keeler (The Greenhornes, The Raconteurs and The Afghan Whigs) replacing Daru Jones on drums and Bobby Emmett subbed in for Quincy McCrary on keyboards. He’s also married again for a third time — and we all know how much he loves the number three with Jack White III serving as one of his two pseudonyms — with his wife Olivia Jean growing her own career in the music industry and contributing at times to his, including recently providing bass or drums for some tracks on No Name. And not that it’s any of our business, but it does seem like they are a “good match” for each other in true Motor City fashion (no pun intended). Plus, we would be remiss to not bring up the fact he has moved away from his strict “no phones” policy, which saw him partner with Yondr up until his return to the stage last year. Watching him shred one axe after the next through a sea of phones in LA might have felt a bit different than what we have come to expect after seeing more than a dozen of his shows, but we can’t say it completely ruined the experience for us with Jack on top of his game and the crowd’s energy level never wavering throughout his 90-minute sets.

All things aside not related to his music, the 12-time Grammy winner still remains a must-see every time he comes town and for us that’s anywhere within a reasonable driving distance. Because as his sound expands further into new territory — this time leaning even harder into his garage-rock roots with some punk elements — and his artistry evolves deeper with each album, Jack’s shows never get old no matter how many evenings you have previously spent with him. Sure, there was a decent amount of overlap in the setlists across these latest three concerts we witnessed, yet Jack’s penchant for improvisation in the live space continues to seep into the overall DNA of his performances and offers a level of ambiguity (in a great way) for fans. Of course a place in the Rock Hall is certainly well-deserved for a multi-hyphenate musician whose biggest hit has been heard blasting out of PA systems in arenas and stadiums at major sporting events for almost 20 years now. In fact, when’s the last time the home team didn’t play “Seven Nation Army” at one point during a game? If you really want to understand what makes Jack so special though, you have to experience the magic of his live shows for yourself.

MAY 12TH – HOLLYWOOD PALLADIUM

Setlist:
Intro Jam
Old Scratch Blues
That’s How I’m Feeling
Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground (The White Stripes song)
Instrumental Jam
Me and the Devil Blues (Robert Johnson cover) (Soap&Skin version)
It’s Rough on Rats (If You’re Asking)
Little Bird (The White Stripes song) (with “Me and the Devi Blues” outro)
Hotel Yorba (The White Stripes song)
What’s Done Is Done
Broken Boy Soldier (The Raconteurs song)
Why Walk a Dog?
Sixteen Saltines
Cannon (The White Stripes song)
The Union Forever (The White Stripes song) (with “Cannon” outro)
Fell in Love With a Girl (The White Stripes song)

Encore:
Encore Jam
Archbishop Harold Holmes
I’m Slowly Turning Into You (The White Stripes song)
What’s the Rumpus?
Lazaretto
Underground (with “Me and the Devil Blues” outro)
Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes song)

MAY 13TH – HOLLYWOOD PALLADIUM

Setlist:
Intro Jam
Old Scratch Blues
I Wanna Be Your Dog (The Stooges cover)
That’s How I’m Feeling
Black Math (The White Stripes song)
Bombing Out
It’s Rough on Rats (If You’re Asking)
Let’s Build a Home (The White Stripes song)
What’s the Rumpus?
High Ball Stepper
Hello Operator (The White Stripes song)
I Cut Like a Buffalo (The Dead Weather song)

Encore:
Encore Jam
Steady, as She Goes (The Raconteurs song)
Archbishop Harold Holmes
Ball and Biscuit (The White Stripes song) (with “You Can’t Get That Stuff No More” by Tampa Red snippet)
Icky Thump (The White Stripes song)
Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes song)

MAY 15TH – SANTA BARBARA BOWL

Setlist:
Intro Jam
Old Scratch Blues
That’s How I’m Feeling
Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground (The White Stripes song)
It’s Rough on Rats (If You’re Asking)
Little Bird (The White Stripes song)
Love Interruption
Cannon (The White Stripes song)
The Union Forever (The White Stripes song)
Tonight (Was a Long Time Ago)
Broken Boy Soldier (The Raconteurs song)
Lazaretto
The Hardest Button to Button (The White Stripes song) (shortened version; >)
Archbishop Harold Holmes

Encore:
Encore Jam
Icky Thump (The White Stripes song)
That Black Bat Licorice
Ball and Biscuit (The White Stripes song)
Underground
Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes song)

The Bam Team’s 5 Favorite Albums & Songs of 2020

Wow, 2020 … what can we say? This year will certainly be remembered for a lot of things, but none more so than the COVID-19 pandemic that has ravaged both the U.S. and world over the last 10 months and forced the live music industry to mostly shutter as musicians pivoted to livestreams and drive-in concerts to keep the show going as best they could and however possible. Yet along the way, we lost musical legends who spanned multiple generations from Neil Peart to Bill Withers to John Prine to Little Richard to Eddie Van Halen to MF DOOM — some due to COVID-19 unfortunately — making these past 12 months even more painful to endure than they already were. Ready to officially flush 2020 down the toilet and start anew? Don’t worry … you’re not alone!

In retrospect though, it has been a very quiet year for The Bam Team. You’ll notice there haven’t been a lot of updates in this space, and that’s partly due to the lack of live music on Planet Earth right now. But it’s also been a hectic time for all of us as we try to navigate our way out of these dark days and into some brighter ones, and like any good remedy nowadays, new music has definitely played its part in helping us physically and emotionally cope with the chaos.

It’s why after several months of inactivity here, we decided to dust the cobwebs off Showbams and deliver a modified version of our annual “Best of” lists like we have done since this blog first started (see our 2019 picks here). While that doesn’t mean we had time to hear and dissect every new album or song in the last 365 days — we are still in a pandemic after all — sharing our own individual picks offers a fun and stimulating opportunity for us to reflect on the year that was in music.

So, without further ado, Showbams presents The Bam Team’s five favorite albums and songs from 2020.

Listen to The Bam Team’s favorite songs of 2020:

Josh Herwitt // Los Angeles

Top 5 Albums of 2020
1. Run the Jewels – RTJ4
One might think that after three critically acclaimed albums with some of the most socially and politically charged material since Rage Against the Machine burst onto the scene, it would only seem natural for Run the Jewels’ act to turn a little stale by their fourth time around. But despite the three-year wait for RTJ4, the longest that the hip-hop duo has gone between releases, the final product — like a fine wine — has only gotten better with time. Anchored by stellar production (a RTJ trademark) and provocative rhymes, the 11-track offering sees the two emcees sounding off on everything from corporate greed to police brutality just days after the tragic death of George Floyd. It also boasts a guest list loaded with star power, with DJ Premier, 2 Chainz, Pharrell Williams, Zack de la Rocha, Mavis Staples and Josh Homme each lending a hand while El-P and Killer Mike inject truth serum into our ears with one verbal haymaker after another. In what proved to be a shitstorm of a year, this was the soundtrack a lot of us needed to survive 2020.

2. My Morning Jacket – The Waterfall II
3. Fleet Foxes – Shore
4. Tame Impala – The Slow Rush
5. Caribou – Suddenly

Favorite live album: Sylvan Esso – WITH

Top 5 Songs of 2020
1. Royal Blood – “Trouble’s Coming”
The British rock duo composed of lead singer/bassist Mike Kerr and drummer Ben Thatcher are gearing up to drop their third LP in 2021 and wisely chose to wet our palette with an absolute banger for its lead single. “Trouble’s Coming” has all the makings of a Royal Blood song — catchy bass riffs that sound like they’re coming out of a guitar, heavy-metal drums and Kerr’s falsetto vocals — while charting a slightly different path for the band, one that conjures up some serious 70’s disco vibes. Just watch this scene from Charlie’s Angels to see what we mean, and if you have a pair of fingerless leather gloves handy, you might as well put those on too. We think Sam Rockwell would approve.

2. My Morning Jacket – “Wasted”
3. Run the Jewels – “JU$T” feat. Pharrell Williams & Zack de la Rocha
4. Pearl Jam – “Dance of the Clairvoyants”
5. Sylvan Esso – “Ferris Wheel”

Favorite remix: Bonobo – “Final Days” (Michael Kiwanuka)

Andrew Pohl // San Francisco

Top 5 Albums of 2020
1. Hum – Inlet
This four-piece’s fifth studio effort came as a complete surprise when it dropped in June, and it was honestly THE album I needed. Being knee-deep into the COVID-19 pandemic, I wasn’t sure what the rest of the year would look like musically, and it was exactly the type of record that hits all the marks for me. It’s sonically huge, it showcases Hum’s trademark ultra-layered, dense instrumentation and it ebbs and flows between energetic and emotive. Inlet was easily my most-listened-to album in 2020.

2. Coriky – Coriky
3. PEARS – PEARS
4. Fiona Apple – Fetch the Bolt Cutters
5. Run the Jewels – RTJ4

Favorite live album: NOFX – The Decline (Live at Red Rocks)

Top 5 Songs of 2020
1. Run the Jewels – “Walking in the Snow”
Oh man, this track was just the thing I needed during what may have been one of the most tense times in modern history. And like all of RTJ4, it absolutely crushes as El-P and Killer Mike bring their signature styles to full effect on this dramatic, yet bouncy tune. The middle section, which sees Mike taking the lead, is not only effective, prophetic and timely, but it also serves as a reminder that the time for action is now and that history has a tendency to repeat itself if we’re not careful. Check out the song’s brand-new music video here, too.

2. Hum – “Desert Rambler”
3. IDLES – “War”
4. Middle-Aged Queers – “Gary’s Making Biscuits”
5. PEARS – “Zero Wheels”

Favorite remix: Squarepusher – “Pink Maggit” (Deftones)

Rochelle Shipman // Los Angeles

Top 5 Albums of 2020
1. Fiona Apple – Fetch the Bolt Cutters
I almost feel cheated that my two No. 1 picks went to the same artist, but this year belonged to Fiona as much as it did to Dr. Fauci. FTBC busted us out of our mental prisons and allowed us to imagine our lives were more exciting than they actually were in 2020. It reminded us that we are strong enough to survive anything, to use our voices to speak even louder for what we believe in and that we can work on our own healing even if we can’t quite get outside. Ms. Apple set women free together.

2. Fleet Foxes – Shore
3. Mura Masa – R.Y.C.
4. Kari Faux – Lowkey Superstar
5. Liv.e – Couldn’t Wait to Tell You…

Favorite live album: Dolores Diaz & The Standby Club – Live at O’Leaver’s

Top 5 Songs of 2020
1. Fiona Apple – “Shameika”
This is a badass, “can-do” tune that was inspired by a passing comment made decades ago, one Fiona surely never thought twice about until now. And as she pounds the piano with the strength of RBG, it’s clear that this is the song 2020 needed — not to mention that it came full circle, inspiring Shameika herself all these years later. Sweet.

2. Noname – “Song 33”
3. Open Mike Eagle feat. Kari Faux – “Bucciarati”
4. Liv.e – “Lessons From My Mistakes…but I Lost Your Number”
5. Quakers feat. Sampa the Great – “Approach with Caution”

Favorite remix: Thundercat feat. Smino & Guapdad 4000 – “Dragonball Durag”

May 19, 2025 by Josh Herwitt 3 Comments