The Black keys: the lonely boys no more
The Black Keys are a two man, indie-blues garage band hailing from Akron, Ohio. Dan Auerbach (bearded one) plays electric guitar and sings while his partner, Patrick Carney (bifocaled one), beats the drums. Carney also receives credit for production and mixing, using his self-described “medium-fidelity” recording technique. Visually, the two remind me of those harmlessly psychotic too-old-for-college types who still live in the dormitory, wearing wrinkled, grey (not the original color) T-shirts and reading sci-fi comics – Auerbach scratching his crumb filled beard and Carney band-aiding his glasses. Yet, this un-dynamic duo, now in their tenth year together, is on the verge of rock superstardom. How could this possibly be happening in today’s music culture of disposable dance moves and grooves?
The band got their start, so to speak, when Auerbach had a spiritual experience, epiphany, wet dream – whatever you want to call it – while listening to a Junior Kimbrough record. As Auerbach says in the liner notes to Chulahoma, The Black Key’s Kimbrough tribute , he was “changed forever” and “in a trance for days.” Kimbrough, a relatively obscure blues artist, released only five albums in his lifetime and seldom ventured far from the front porch, except for regular forays to Junior’s Place, his Chulahoma, Mississippi juke-joint. He sang and played guitar in a droning, distorted delta-blues style, featuring a repetitive, trance-like one chord groove.
