The Black Keys - Attack & Release

[Fresh Tendrils]

Despite the somewhat disappointing Magic Potion, I still have faith that Pat & Dan can bounce back and release another good album to go along with Thickfreakness and Rubber Factory.

The release date is April 1st and the single/music video is up on their Myspace page - http://www.myspace.com/theblackkeys

It is the first album of theirs to be recorded in a studio and is produced by Danger. Yes, Danger Mouse.

[Skerik]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack & Release

It is the first album of theirs to be recorded in a studio and is produced by Danger. Yes, Danger Mouse.

Ugh. I loved their first three albums, was disappointed with Magic Potion and I think this effort is going to represent another step down the wrong path for this band. These guys won a lot of fans with their unadorned, unproduced, dirty and authentic roots rock sound and the last thing I wanted to see from them was to hook up with some big name studio producer for their next album. Disappointing.

[bkfount]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack & Release

yeah, I liked them after seeing them live in packed clubs. Their newer stuff got away from that. good for them though I guess, every band grows.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack & Release

Ugh. I loved their first three albums, was disappointed with Magic Potion and I think this effort is going to represent another step down the wrong path for this band. These guys won a lot of fans with their unadorned, unproduced, dirty and authentic roots rock sound and the last thing I wanted to see from them was to hook up with some big name studio producer for their next album. Disappointing.

Lies is a pretty good song and still in tune and representative of the quality with some of the slower songs they have done in the past. Strange Times features some added production, though. Either way I will reserve judgment until I hear the album. Their sound was great, but I thought with Magic Potion it was starting to get repetitive. Maybe they can pull off an Iron & Wine.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack & Release

<a href="http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=30049 396">Strange Times</a><br><embed src="http://lads.myspace.com/videos/vplayer.swf" flashvars="m=30049396&v=2&type=video" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="430" height="346"></embed>

[CM1847]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Looking forward to this one. Magic Potion didn't blow me away the first time I heard it, but it's an album I always have the urge to listen to every few weeks, which is more than I can say for the majority of my music collection.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Looking forward to this one. Magic Potion didn't blow me away the first time I heard it, but it's an album I always have the urge to listen to every few weeks, which is more than I can say for the majority of my music collection.

Really? I haven't really had an urge to listen to the entire album since I took it out of my car's CD player about 3 weeks after it was released. I have listened to it since then, don't get me wrong, but I haven't really felt a great need to hear it all again, especially when Thickfreakness and Rubber Factory are right beside it.

[sportsdude]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

well count me in the minority that liked Magic Potion. I actually liked it a lot and still listen to it often. To me, I think they tried to carry over the sound from Chulahoma, though this time they obviously weren't Junior's songs so maybe that's why people didn't like it. But yeah I really liked Magic Potion and I'm looking forward to the new one. Hopefully it leaks soon.

[CM1847]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

well count me in the minority that liked Magic Potion. I actually liked it a lot and still listen to it often. To me, I think they tried to carry over the sound from Chulahoma, though this time they obviously weren't Junior's songs so maybe that's why people didn't like it. But yeah I really liked Magic Potion and I'm looking forward to the new one. Hopefully it leaks soon.

I agree that Magic Potion is a good album.

Attack & Release comes out next week, I think it's been leaked for over a month now.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Bump. Comes out tomorrow. I'm pumped to get my hands on it. AMG released their review of the album and seems to be pretty positive and likes the direction the band is going in.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Pitchfork's Review

The Black Keys seemed doomed to linger in the long, black-and-red shadow of the White Stripes. That's perhaps unfair: Akron's Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney have perfected their own brand of Delta-tinged, garage minimalism. But after four albums, even they seemed to realize they had hit a creative wall. Luckily, in 2007, they were tapped by producer Danger Mouse for a collaboration with Ike Turner, though when he passed away last December, the project left the duo with a host of material. This became the foundation of their fifth and most adventurous album to date. Maneuvering between the King of Rhythm's joie de vivre and their crestfallen, crossroads-blues heritage, Attack and Release subtly expands the Black Keys sound. An auteur raised on hip-hop, DM keeps the record from staying overly loyal to the Creedence or Free templates. This is a small but crucial difference from 2006's Magic Potion. He colors the band's no-frills narratives with futuristic accents or, on the opposite end, rural flourishes of psychedelia and folk. On each track they add a bolt of surprise that amplifies the pitch-black mood and message. Take the flutes and feedback of "Same Old Thing", which in combination suggest a childlike innocence peeled away by a cold, indifferent world. Likewise, a tension opens between the peppy xylophone and world-weary, Waitsian tremolo on "So He Won't Break". Longtime Waits and Elvis Costello guitarist Marc Ribot lends his powers to this song and to the anguished 6/8 masterpiece "Lies". Here (and elsewhere: "Psychotic Girl", "I Got Mine", "Strange Times") Danger Mouse's layer of backing vocals imbue these earthly stories with a beyond-the-grave air, taking lost-love themes to an eerily literal but quintessentially blues-y level. The unexpected organ line of "All You Ever Wanted" feels like a police ambush on this jilted-John ballad. We almost forget that, in light of the band's uniformly lo-fi discography, nearly every fresh sound on Attack & Release should strike us as alien.
A sequence of slow burns, the record's tempos allow you to relish the details and the textures. "Remember When (Side A)", with its eddies of reverb, envisions nostalgia as something dim and meticulously crafted, with a touch of the fantastic. Speaking of the past, the raw, amplified wallop of the Black Keys' old days is still here, too. Given that Ike Turner was partly responsible for rock'n'roll's love affair with distortion, it would have been wrong for Attack & Release to discard fuzzy riffs. The other side of "Remember When" will sooth anyone longing for their sinewy Nuggets rave-ups. Fans of previous BK records will find this song and the first single, "Strange Times", the bluntest weapons here.
"Things Ain't Like They Used to Be" leads the album to a grim finish. Auerbach's sluggish, hung-over melodies, echoed by teenage protégé Jessica Lea Mayfield's distant singing, carry an air of defeat. Addressed to an old lover, the lyrics describe a happier past, overgrown yards, a man blindly walking into battles, and other ingredients of lament. Yet Carney and Auerbach know that there's more to the blues than bad news. These men are stoics to the fingertips. "It doesn't mean a thing to me," Auerbach repeats on the chorus. The jaded ex of "Same Old Thing" speaks the same language: "It don't matter where you been." We know better.

-Roque Strew, <abbr class="dtreviewed" title="20080401">April 01, 2008</abbr>

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Has nobody else picked this up yet?

I'm enjoying it a lot; significantly better than Magic Potion. I expect there to be a lot of backlash against the guys for stepping away from their lo-fi, crunch-riffed blues, but I thought they had mined that long enough. This isn't like any of their other albums as one would expect with Danger Mouse as the producer; however, DM doesn't overhaul The Black Keys style or overload the music with layers. There is still very much a simplicity to the music and its just as haunting (if not more so) than anything else they have done. The album isn't a departure from their "old" sound, its merely a broadening of the palette much like Iron & Wine did with The Shepherd's Dog and what My Morning Jacket did with Z. Yes, the production is a lot cleaner than their previous albums, but the music still sounds like you're hearing it through a tin-wall and the guitars are still fuzzy.

Personally, I am totally digging the direction the guys have taken with their music and I don't think this album should be slept on at all.

Psychotic Girl FTW!

[sportsdude]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

Has nobody else picked this up yet?

I'm enjoying it a lot; significantly better than Magic Potion. I expect there to be a lot of backlash against the guys for stepping away from their lo-fi, crunch-riffed blues, but I thought they had mined that long enough. This isn't like any of their other albums as one would expect with Danger Mouse as the producer; however, DM doesn't overhaul The Black Keys style or overload the music with layers. There is still very much a simplicity to the music and its just as haunting (if not more so) than anything else they have done. The album isn't a departure from their "old" sound, its merely a broadening of the palette much like Iron & Wine did with The Shepherd's Dog and what My Morning Jacket did with Z. Yes, the production is a lot cleaner than their previous albums, but the music still sounds like you're hearing it through a tin-wall and the guitars are still fuzzy.

Personally, I am totally digging the direction the guys have taken with their music and I don't think this album should be slept on at all.

Psychotic Girl FTW!

Yeah I like it. I haven't listened to it that much yet as I just got two other albums (Del's 11th Hour and Atmosphere's Sad Clown Bad Spring) but so far so good. As for significantly better than Magic Potion, well I can't really agree with you there. I know I was one of the few that really liked Magic Potion, but I just can't see what it did so poorly that Attack and Release does well.

[Qb]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

I plan on picking this up in the near future. Anyone seen any good deals out there? Also, have they announced any tour information yet? I always missed them for some reason or another when they've come to Pittsburgh in the past and would love to see them...

[CM1847]

Re: The Black Keys - Attack &amp; Release

I just got this yesterday, been listening to it non-stop since(when I've had the chance). I like it a lot so far. I think the slower songs on the album("All You Ever Wanted", "Things Ain't Like They Used To Be") are really, really good. Much better than I would have expected out of slow tracks from this band. They provide their share of dirty garages-blues too, "I Got Mine" is a good example. Overall, I think it's a good mix, it definitely doesn't run-together like Magic Potion did initially. It may not be as catchy as Rubber Factory, but it does a very good job of switching things up song-to-song which really makes it a very interesting listen.