A baseball stadium crowd singing him “Happy Birthday” (courtesy of John C. Reilly) wasn’t the only gift Jack White received for his 50th birthday on Wednesday. As the musician shared on his Instagram, he also received his first cell phone.
“Well, you guys are all good for me now, or just the beginning. I am now the reluctant owner of a cell phone for the first time in my life! A beautiful 50th birthday, courtesy of my beautiful and thoughtful wife, Mrs. Olivia Jean,” White wrote. “I’ve been saying my days are numbered for years, I can’t listen to my music in my car, I can’t park in a parking lot alone because of QR codes, etc. etc. And I guess Olivia decided to be kind and put me in a place where I expose myself to more than I would extinct. Times of social interaction pi.”
White previously discussed his aversion to cell phones in a 2019 interview with the UK’s Channel 4. “I’ve never owned one, so when I’m out there, I’m an anomaly, and I’m looking at everyone. To me, everyone looks silly,” he said at the time.
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He also notably banned the use of cell phones during his live performances, becoming one of the first musicians to adopt phone storage pouches. “I thought it was a great art project at first, just to see if people would think it was funny, or cool, or just a new experience, like an escape room,” he said of the move. “To my surprise, and everyone else’s surprise, everyone loved it.”
On the other hand, White added: “It brings up these big questions like, ‘So you need someone to tell you you can’t use it to actually not use it?’ That’s sad, that’s really sad.
