In the popular press’ rush to drool all over The White Stripes two years ago, The Black Keys, a far superior alternative in the white-boy, blues-rock genre, was significantly overlooked. Lead guitarist Dan Auerbach eclipses Jack White’s guitar chops and can sing circles around him, while Patrick Carney’s manic drum lines put Meg White’s painfully basic technique to shame. On its third album, Rubber Factory, the Keys has created its most thoroughly rocking and well-rounded release to date.
While the duo’s sophomore album, Thickfreakness, seemed to be rehashing the same song throughout, Rubber Factory succeeds largely due to the diversity of its content. Auerbach’s vocal range had never seemed all that impressive on earlier albums, but here he manages to go from the shrieks of “All Hands Against His Own” to the quiet crooning of the break-up ballad “The Lengths” with surprising skill. The latter is the album’s most impressive, capturing a quieter, melancholic side of the Keys that it hadn’t yet expressed. But the Keys has by no means abandoned its blues-rock, and the production on the album continues in the same dirty, unpolished vein as its previous work. Lead single “10 A.M. Automatic” is a gritty little piece of guitar magic, and the cover of the Kinks’ “Act Nice and Gentle” drags the original’s pop arrangements through the dirt and mud of the blues, ending up with a terrific rock song.
There are problems with this formula that the Keys has yet to resolve. The first half can get slow, especially the undistinguished “Just Couldn’t Tie Me Down.” A few songs seem either underdeveloped or an excuse for more longwinded, albeit technically excellent, guitar solos. All the same, when Auerbach rips out the stinging breakdown on the phenomenal cover of legendary blues-man Robert Pete Williams’ “Grown So Ugly,” there’s little arguing with either the band’s skills or the quality of Rubber Factory as a whole.
