The mayor of Lambeth drew on countless hours of grilling local politicians during laborious council meetings as she turned her interviewing skills on American rock musician Jack White.

Councillor Christiana Valcarcel found herself the centre of attention when, having played his new album Blunderbuss for a crowd of 200 in South Bank County Hall, ex-White Stripes frontman White appeared before a stunned audience and sat down with the Mayor for questioning on Tuesday, March 20.

The Mayor declined to use the prepared questionnaire and asked her own questions, which included grilling the multimillionaire rockstar on his upholstery business.

Coun Varcarcel said: "He said 'yes, he was in the upholstery business in his early life and now he's resurrected it'.

"He turned to the audience and said 'if anyone needs upholstery work he's there to do it'.

"So I said 'as the Mayor, I want some upholstery done and I'm putting in my order now'."

Coun Valcarcel said she was not entirely unused to dealing with musicians, as she was once a music critic on a TV show in Sierra Leone.

"It was called Pop Jury, I was a member of a panel," she said.

"If a record comes out, you say whether it will be a hit or a miss."

The mayor gave White’s album Blunderbuss "10 out of 10" and her favourite tracks were 'Love Interruption' and 'Hypocritical Kiss'.

She probed six-time Grammy Award-winning White on the meaning of the latter: "I asked him, 'what do you mean by 'hypocritical kiss''?

"Then I turned to the audience and I said 'have you ever experienced a 'hypocrital kiss'?'"

Coun Valcarcel said she had never experienced such a kiss: "That's why I was asking him to tell me."

Despite turning up for the function in full regalia, the mayor said she hadn't realised White was an internationally successful musician before the meeting.

She said: "I only realised he was a rock star after the event, when I saw all these top ranking music producers were coming to me and saying well done madame mayor, that was a great interview."