The Evening Blues

The Black Keys - Rubber Factory

The Black Keys have blown up. They're in a million commercials, in heavy rotation of KROQ, and are finding new fans in overgrounders desperately digging at what is being unearthed from the underground.

But here's the catch - unlike fellow Indie-turned-Mainstream bores Kings of Leon or Cold War Kids, they haven't changed a thing from when they were nobodies. From their 2002 debut, The Big Come Up to the current smash hit Brothers, it's the same music. The production gets better over time, of course, but fundamentally, everything is still firmly planted in it's DIY, Akron, Ohio, boredom blues roots.

Rubber Factory, the duo's third LP, is the one I'm choosing to share with you today. It's more confident than the two records preceding it, but still has that down-home rawness that this blog loves. It opens up with snapping, dirge-like drum beats which segues into drawling guitar and the pained drag of Dan Auerbach's voice. "You know what the sun's all about/When the lights go out" he croons. But with the second track 10 A.M. Automatic, the album is off to it's raucous, white boy blues start. Aurbach channels fuzzed out six-strings on par with the likes of Jack White, but unlike Jack, he's got a much, much more skilled drummer backing him, in the form of Patrick Carney (who also produces.)

The Blues are something rarely done well. You can try to fake it, many do, but when it's being phoned in, it stands out like a greensnake in a beet patch. These boys may not have ever ridden a train or had a woman walk out on them during a dust bowl, but there's an undeniable passion their music. I can't help but hope that if the old Delta masters could listen in on these guys, they might give them an approving nod, even if begrudgingly.

So, get as big as you want boys, my fingers are crossed the fame won't ruin you like it has so many.

-Thom