Jack White claims world record after recording, cutting and selling single in 4 hours

Former White Stripes frontman Jack White has recorded, cut and sold a seven-inch single in four hours, as part of the celebrations for Record Store Day.

Jack White took to the stage at his Third Man Records’ store in Nashville at 10:00 on Saturday and played two songs.

They were cut directly to an acetate disc, which was rushed to a pressing plant. The finished records were on sale within three hours and 55 minutes.

Jack White claimed to have set a world record as a result.

Guinness World Records says Swiss polka trio Vollgas Kompanie currently hold the title for “fastest album release”, having issued their album Live on August 16, 2008, the day after it was recorded.

Marillion has the record for “fastest music DVD release”, taking just 10 hours to film, edit and press copies of their concert movie Clocks Already Ticking.

However, there is no current record for fastest single release – possibly because the iTunes era allows songs to go on sale within minutes of being completed.

Paul McCartney and U2 are believed to have set a record in 2005, when their Live 8 performance of Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band was purchased 45 minutes after being performed on stage in London’s Hyde Park.

“I never even looked into who has the fastest record,” Jack White admitted to reporters during a press conference on Saturday afternoon.

Jack White said he was more concerned with making sure the record got made at all.

“I woke up at about four in the morning last night, and I thought, <<Wow. I think there’s about 12 or 13 things that could really go wrong tomorrow>>,” he told The Tennessean.

“I just thought how difficult it was going to be to explain to people if we didn’t pull it off, so thank God we did.”

The single comprised Lazaretto, the title track to Jack White’s forthcoming album, and a cover of Elvis Presley’s 1969 song Power of My Love.

“Originally, we were just gonna do this record and go back to sleep,” Jack White told the audience.

Instead, Jack White played an hour-long set, including a mix of new songs and White Stripes favorites such as Hotel Yorba and Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground.