The Black Keys - Brothers

Taylor's Choice:

The Black Keys - Brothers

Hipster Review:

Over the course of the last decade, The Black Keys have been indie music's main supplier of classicist blues, and both their debut The Big Come Up and follow-up Thickfreakness are early 00's Garage rock landmarks. But as the years progressed, so did the duo's sound: their fourth album (and disappointing throwaway) Magic Potion was a step away from their simple blues roots and saw the band trying their hand at pop sensibility. Then with their fifth album Attack & Release, the group went for their pop focus head-on, while also bumping up their production by adding a wash of Psychedelic flair to the songs. On Brothers, the Psychedelia is more of a pinch, and takes a backseat to the myriad of other bells and whistles the band has added to their sound. The production here is spit-shine clean, completely removing the group from their Lo-fi roots, and to some this may elicit a complaint. Personally, I feel that the band finally got their attempts at genre-mixing right this time, not adding too much and stopping their flow of ideas when they need to. The songs are more poppy than ever before, but there is still that classic Black Keys blues touch. My main complaint with the album is that it's too long (55 minutes is shaky ground), though I may just be saying this because I'm used to a short-but-sweet experience with this band. Overall, the songs are well-crafted and the group's ideas are expanded yet limited, and it's nice to see them getting the expansive part right this time around. It's on the lengthy side, but thankfully it doesn't mar the experience too much.

Hipster Rating:

8.2

Friend Review:

Hmmmmm what do I want to say about this album… Well first, I’ll say this: that is some of the best album art I’ve ever seen. Seriously, it’s just very unique and creative. And none of that hidden meaning crap, this art tells it like it is! But besides the art I can’t say I was very pleased with the album.
This is one of those that at the end just left me dull. I don’t really have strong emotions about it. It started out nice, it felt really jazzy. I honestly liked the feel of the opener “Everlasting Light”, but besides that, the album just seemed to drag on. It’s rather long for my taste at over 55:00 and there’s nothing overly exciting about it. It’s all very chill. So if that’s the sound you’re going for then it’ll work out fantastic for you but to me it’s quite boring. Sorry. This my first experience with The Black Keys. Before this, any discussion involving The Black Keys would have evoked this response from me: “Um, I’ve heard of them but haven’t really listened to any of their stuff…” Sadly, Brothers doesn’t make me interested in any of their other work at all. I don’t hear anything more than average out of this album.

Friend Rating:

5.4

Coming up on Wednesday, Nothing Hurts by Male Bonding!