Touring behind their latest album, “Turn Blue,” Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney deliver a brilliantly constructed chronicle of their career during a Grand Rapids tour stop with Cage the Elephant.
Masterful Show: Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys at Van Andel Arena on Sunday. {Photo/Anna Sink)
The Black Keys get it.
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Having the inventive and wildly energetic, pop-laced garage-rock/alt-rock band Cage the Elephant open for the Akron boys on Sunday night at Grand Rapids’ Van Andel Arena made perfect sense.
And come December, the oddly experimental, deliciously entertaining St. Vincent, aka Annie Clark, will join The Black Keys on tour.
It’s par for the course for Black Keyes guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney who profess love for pioneering music ranging from bluesman Junior Kimbrough to new wave faves Devo, and explains a lot about their insistence on doing things their own way.
Sellout Crowd: About 8,000 fans cheered The Black Keys on Sunday. (Photo/Local Spins)
After all, this duo once upon a time was a trailblazing band in its own right, re-interpreting blues with raw, garage rock-filtered fury while touring tiny clubs and playing for anyone willing to listen.
Now, they’re full-fledged arena rock stars, touring behind “Turn Blue,” their first album to ever hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. And they know it takes exposure and the support of other musicians to ascend to these big stages, so offering a helping hand to other groundbreaking bands is part of their genetic makeup.
More than that, however, The Black Keys get what it takes to stay true to the roots of what they do while pushing the envelope in new directions to keep things fresh – while adding plenty of smart, stage glitz and lighting wallop to better showcase their music for arena-sized crowds.
PERFECTLY PACED, PRIMAL GARAGE-ROCK BEAUTY
Consequently, their 1-hour-and-44-minute Grand Rapids show on Sunday night was a brilliantly constructed, perfectly paced and artfully displayed summary of their 13-year career, mixing deep-track oldies (2002’s “Leavin’ Trunk” from their first album) with big hits (“Lonely Boy,” “Fever,” “Gold on the Ceiling”), brand new tunes (“It’s Up to You Now,” “Turn Blue,” “Gotta Get Away”) and even a crazy-cool cover of Scotland musician Edwyn Collins’ “A Girl Like You.”
Perfect, Primal Beats: The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney. (Photo/Anna Sink)
After a truly rousing opening set by pop-hued, Kentucky alt-rock band Cage the Elephant, led by singer and human amphetamine Matt Schulz, who literally never stopped moving, strutting, leaping and twirling, The Black Keys launched into their set with 2011’s “Howlin’ For You,” a towering, classic-looking theater curtain behind them. (It eventually drew back to reveal a battery of lights and video screens, which flashed colorful pop-art-styled images all night long.)
For the 20 or so songs that followed, The Black Keys – with touring bassist Richard Swift and keyboard player John Clement Wood – delivered what they do best: primal garage-rock beauty cross-breeded with melodic hooks and thunderous, bluesy riffs that had the arena crowd of 8,000 in a froth the entire evening.
Auerbach’s devotion as a guitarist to tones and textures and raw, electric frizzle perfectly complements Carney’s feral drumming ferocity, with Wood adding the right soulful, infectious keyboard accents (especially on the duo’s newer material). And Auerbach’s melancholy lyrical twists on love and heartache and infidelity just make it all that much more delicious.
Indeed, there were too many highlights on Sunday to mention them all – the funkier than usual, shifting-rhythms take on “Strange Times,” the one-two punch of “It’s Up to You Now” and searing “Leavin’ Trunk,” the blistering rendition of “She’s Long Gone,” the primeval roar of “Your Touch.”
More impressive yet, this is not a band that stands still or rests on its revamped blues laurels: Some of the duo’s latest material delves slyly into pop and nearly Pink Floyd-like psychedelic rock, with “Gotta Get Away” coming across as a made-for-radio, Southern rock gem.
But at the very end, when Auerbach and Carney pared down to play as their old twosome for the first time all night, churning out 2008’s “I Got Mine,” they proved they can still marshall the sort of two-man, bare-knuckled, blues-infused power that energizes and captivates young and old fans alike.
Yes, The Black Keys get it … and they got it right on Sunday night.
THE BLACK KEYS: PHOTOS BY ANNA SINK
CAGE THE ELEPHANT: PHOTOS BY DWAYNE HOOVER
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Copyright 2014, Spins on Music
