For the first Black Keys album in five years, Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney played things loose.
As Carney explains, that no frills element is also baked into the bands DNA.
Its always been the MO for Dan and I: simplicity, he tells EW.
Credit: Alysse Gafkjen
Theres beauty in simplicity.
But for me and my tastes, its usually more understated.
The less-is-more aesthetic doesnt extend to all the influences that helped inspireLets Rock.
Tom Hill/Getty Images
I particularly likeVice Principals.
If you think about it, its so hard to make something good thats funny.
Youve run through so many things.
Tom Hill/Getty Images
To actually construct something thats meant to be funnypurposely funnyis very hard, I think.Vice Principalsis incredible.
I ended up becoming obsessed with it.
You either get it or you dont, and if you get it, youre part of a club.
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Carney
The Stooges Fun House
Its a record that Im always listening to.
But I definitely came back to it when we started making this album.
Its all about the energy in the tracks.
Theres a simplicity that is just so visceral to me.
I find it to be the pure essence of rock & roll.
Its like orange juice concentrate: Theres nothing watered down, and its hard for most people to stomach.
I find it really inspiring.
Theres not many drum fills, theres not many lyrics.
It may be the blueprint for punk rock.
But they really are one of the coolest rock & roll bands.
In the canon of American rock & roll, ZZ Top is definitely towards the top of the list.
Theres no frills, theres no synthesizers on that record.
Theres not any drum fills really, theres just cool rhythm, cool melodies.
Its essentially a guitar album, which is what we were trying to make.
When Pat and I were first making our demos, we were really inspired by him.
A lot of the way I play is influenced by the way T-Model played.
I didnt know him, I just drove to the town I knew he was from and searched.
I found him, and we ended up playing music.
Me and my friends ended up staying with him for a couple of days.
Auerbach
This Is Spinal Tap
Thats just the influence for our lives.
No matter if youre in an arena rock band or a punk band, everything in it is relevant.
I was watching him almost every Thursday [at a bar in Cleveland].
A year and a half ago, I invited him to come to the studio.
They had just executed a prisoner [a couple of days] before in Nashville by electric chair.
They asked him if he had any final words, and he said, Lets rock.
When we were thinking about album titles, it just kept coming back to my mind.
It just felt like a sign or something, like we were supposed to use it.
Its always been something that Id love to put into the music that Dan and I make.
