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The MOAN | The BIG COME UP
The Black Keys specialize in stripped-down, indie-fied blues, complete with punchy riffs and Hendrix-esque guitar squalls (...) The low-fi buzz goes just fine with the excellently rough edges built into their sound. - Christian Hoard / Rolling Stone (3 STAR rating)

For those people who have still not discovered the bombastic sounds of The Black Keys, I shake my head in disgust. The Keys combine the perfect sounds of deep South homegrown delta blues with 70s Detroit rock n' roll thunder. Having released two masterpiece albums full of their hybrid blues/rock compositions, the Keys decided to release a catchy EP of four songs that are a mix of two familiar songs and two new songs, so to speak. "Heavy Soul" was released on their first album. On this EP, it is a more raw and alternate version. "Have Love Will Travel" was on their second disc, but it is presented again in a more stripped-down form then it had been previously. "The Moan" is a song that had seen the light of day on a split 12" but had been recorded live. On this EP, "The Moan" is the actual recorded studio version, which showcases the tightness between the guitar player and the drummer in their song structures. "No Fun" is a cover of The Stooges classic, which is amazing to hear as a souped-up blues rock nugget. Having this EP take its place among the other two Keys discs is to have the complete music catalog from the band, which is a worthwhile addition to any music lover's collection. - Kevlar7 / Slugmag

The Moan is a four-song EP from Akron, Ohio's best (and possibly only) grunge blues duo. Two of the four songs, 'Heavy Soul' and 'Have Love Will Travel', appear on other albums, but 'The Moan' and 'No Fun' are priceless rarities. - Jon Levin / Rockpile

The Big Come Up was released in 2002 on Alive records. An impressive heap of critical praise followed. In response to the positive reactions to the band, Auerbach and Carney went back into their basement on Sept. 11, 2002 and laid down two more tracks. The Black Keys' gritty, bare-bones combination of rock'n'roll and the blues is echoed on this, their first picture sleeve. Both the music and the graphic design is stripped of excess and presented in a manner that reminds me of looking into the sun. If you don't have the record yet, do yourself a favor and go to www.alive-totalenergy to order it. Not only will the collector in you be thankful in years to come, but your ears will also be most appreciative. - Charles Szabla / Goldmine

And although the CD single's four tracks only include one of the new Keys material, two covers and an alternate take on a track from their first record, most listeners will still be blown away by how traditionally Blues-y two Ohio white boys can sound. The Black Keys also take on The Stooges' "No Fun" and Richard Berry's "Have Love Will Travel." Both are great, and maybe the best part of the release. - NowOnTour (rating 4 out of 5)

The Black Keys are cool, that's for sure. Twenty-First Century Cool.
A two piece from Ohio with lo-fi recordings and retro-artwork on one hand and a kick-ass website with online merchandise and live performance clips on the other. They've got a sound both nasty and massive and yet they could probably tour the country in a Mini Cooper if they had to. They're the best of what roots rock and the D.I.Y. spirit has come to represent in the last fifty years. The MOAN is a four-track e.p. that continues the rawboned blues (as Peter Relic describes the duo in Rolling Stone) of their critically acclaimed debut The BIG COME UP and their follow up full length THICKFREAKNESS, with a heavier take on 'Have Love Will Travel' from the latter release and an alternate, but equally cool, version of 'Heavy Soul' from the former. RATING=10. - kevchino / Sunset Underground

The Black keys has so incorporated the Delta juke joint hard-liquor blues sound that the duo of Patrick Carney (percussion) and Dan Auerbach (guitar/vocals) sounds out with deep-rooted authenticity on each track of this 4-song CDEP. The primitive instrumentation and raw blues sound is gritty and substantial. Auerbach does not feel it necessary to growl aloud like Jon Spencer, but instead lets flow melodically, if disjointedly, and the vocals are soulful, if rugged, as in "Heavy Soul". Another standout track on the album is when the pair takes Iggy Pop's "No Fun" for a Mississippi drift down to where the kudzu grows. - Outsight

Bass player? The Black Keys don't need no stinkin' bass player! Not when they've got a singer who can do that great Iggy Pop-meets-Michael McDonald trick. This four-song EP is perfect stripped-down raw soul. - Brian J. Bowe / Creem

Pieced together from 7-inch B-sides and alternate takes, 'The Moan' is a dirt-under-the-fingernails testament to the Black Keys' reign over old-school rock 'n' blues. Sunk in the sludge amid Otis Redding, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and the Melvins, the Black Keys fold chunky guitar licks and rawboned rhythm thunder into a grizzled swamp chug, slurping down a pair of originals, a Stooges cover ("No Fun") and Richard Berry's "Have Love Will Travel." - Newt Briggs / Las Vegas Mercury

Damn it! The Black Keys are putting the sex back in the good ol' blues. Not sure if sex ever left the blues but I do know that assholes like Gary Moore and Eric Clapton have done their share of taking the pleasure out of the genre. Anyway, The Black Keys are sexy as hell (musically of cource) and are making the blues fun again. They have their own laidback und ultra cool style and it's quite amazing how a stripped down line-up of drums, guitar and vocals can be all it takes. Simplicity and less is more are the keywords here and it just works for The Black Keys. The title track is the only new song on this 4 track EP and it's of the usual high standard. The remaining tracks are from the debut album "The Big Come Up" including their personal covers of The Stooges' "No Fun" and Sonics' "Have Love Will Travel". Would make more sence to pick up the above mentioned album as well as the new one on Fat Possum... but for starters this is all recommended. I have still not gotten over the fact that The Black Keys cancelled their scheduled gig in Copenhagen recently. That was not polite! - Don K / Low Cut

A 4-song blast from the sultans of raw power blues awaits you. The Black Keys were the toast of the town a year ago and this EP is to get the gums flapping again about the dynamic duo. They're young, white and from Akron, Ohio, so no wonder they sound like grizzled old whisky-soaked Missippians. The fact is, these two can crank out a howling full sound, like starting up the GTO inside the garage. They rework The Stooges' "No Fun" into a traditional blues arrangement and dress it up in brokedown rock rags. Add this to their earlier Beatles cover and you're kind of left hanging because there's nothing resembling those bands in their music (...) At any rate, BK are a gutsy union of garage heat and fret-worryin' blues. I like 'em because they're a low-voiced thrash version of The White Stripes with a kickass drummer. - Paul Leeds / Culture Bunker

Here's how you get excited about the Black Keys : listen to them. Their Frankensound is created from bits of Led Zeppelin, Howlin' Wolf, Black Crowes, Dead Kennedys and Otis Redding. New stomp "The Moan" and the b-side's brash handling of oft-covered Richard Berry tune "Have Love Will Travel" are sure to Lazarus up any block party. Sneak these onto Grandpa's mix tape beside some early Junior Wells. - William Bowers / Magnet

That's a lotta action for two weird beards from Akron reviving Cream's heavy blues rumble with broke-ass amplifiers, who still release their stuff on fiercely independent labels like Fat Possum and Alive. Ya know what that means? It means that the Black Keys really don't give a fuck about nuthin' except for rocking. And you gotta love that, man. "The Moan" is their latest single, a muddy, fuzzed-out groove that makes even yr eyeballs feel greasy. - Sleazegrinder

A killer, bluesy Midwest two-piece who aren't the White Stripes.
Rawboned blues duo the Black Keys hail from Akron, Ohio, but a listen to "The Big Come Up" suggests the Keys may have been raised by Mississippi ridge-runners. While Dan Auerbach's overdriven ax is powered by the same internal-combustion engine that drove blues legends Junior Kimbrough and Fred McDowell, this is no po-faced retro show. There's Wu-Tang Clan-schooled funk in drummer Patrick Carney's fatback beats, and on the cranked-up "Countdown," Auerbach suppresses a sob with the droll closing couplet, "You stole my heart and damn near drove me mad/I gotta get back home to my mom and dad." From the truthfully titled "Heavy Soul" to a devolved, choogling cover of the Beatles' "She Said, She Said," this is a righteous choice for rock debut of the year. In a world gone White Stripes crazy, save room in your heart and CD wallet for the Black Keys.
Peter Relic / Rolling Stone #907 - October 2002 (4 star rating)

The BIG COME UP | The MOAN
Remember when you had to have talent to be in a band? Recall the days when you had to have chops to play the guitar. Think about music that had distinctive vocals that you could identify the band instantly; people like Howlin' Wolf and Otis Redding fall indelibly into this category. Since punk, the feeling and sound that any schlub can make music has perpetuated music. And while numerous amazing bands have sprung up due to this belief, don't forget the piles of junk that seep out of your speakers more often than not. Personally, I long for music that is so defined that you can only find it on oldies stations these days. Enter Akron, Ohio's the Black Keys. Sure, Akron is nowhere near the Mississippi Delta, but that doesn't mean there isn't blues there. Actually, rumor has it that singer/guitarist Dan Auerbach lived in the Delta for some time learning from Fat Possum bluesman T-Model Ford while sleeping on his floor. At any rate, soul is not something you can learn, even by sleeping on James Brown's floor, it has to come naturally. And the Keys have bucket loads of soul. The band roars through thirteen bluesey numbers with a cool confidence that few young acts possess. The record consists of solid electric blues tunes, backed by Patrick Carney's swinging drumbeats. Auerbach's grimy voice can pass the litmus test of true blues. Clearly, the band is well versed in blues history. While many bands pledge allegiance to the blues flag lately, most are merely garage bands that have a couple Blues Explosion records. The Keys have a gritty soul that expands the texture of this record, making it a personal affair. - Pat Wensink / Skyscrapper
This Ohio duo indulges in Gories-style minimalism, with a heavier dose of the blues. Guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney sound like the garage is as far as they'll ever get. Where the White Stripes reminded everyone that alt rock could still contain graceful '60s hooks and prettiness, the Black Keys, with their heroic cover of 'She Said, She Said," drag the Beatles back to the Cavern. - Spin Magazine

The Black Keys play stripped-down, raw, vintage-style blues that could have been produced by Leonard and Phil Chess in the 50s. But more than revisionists, they're full of their own swaggering self-confidence, soulful hollers, and fuzz tone buzz. The Big Come Up, the first album by this two-piece powerhouse from Akron, Ohio, could be the best blues album in years. You may not have heard of them yet, but The Black Keys won't be a secret for long. This dynamic duo serves up stripped-down blues - two garage-jammin' musicians getting back to the basics and keeping it real - real simple. The band features Dan Auerback on his 'triplofonic' guitar and vocals; he's one of those rare singers whose earthy, raucous voice sounds much older than he is. At 22, his guitar work is exceedingly accomplished and spirited. His partner, the talented, gangly, bespectacled Patrick Carney, pounds on a "broke beat kit." Carney also produced the album, giving it a vintage sound with his patented "medium-fidelity" recording technique, which he describes as combining "equal parts broke-ass shit to equal part hot-ass shit." Auerback and Carney have an emotional investment in their Mississippi-style music. Legend has it that Auerback headed down to the region unannounced and apprenticed with T Model Ford. And at times, you feel like the boys are channeling the blues, resurrecting the spirit of the founding fathers of rock 'n' roll, masters like Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf. The album opens strong with "Busted," a tune reminiscent of R.L. Burnside, with its driving riffs and the steady, snapping of Carney's snare. "Do the Rump," an improvement on the Junior Kimbrough original, delivers a fierce, fuzz-laced guitar. "I'll Be Your Man" sounds like the classic it's bound to become. "Countdown" adds Gabe Fulvimar's moog bass to the mix. He's also featured on the best Beatles cover ever, "She Said, She Said." Among the strongest pieces is "Heavy Soul," a burning love song riding a virtuous groove that blows up in the last 20 seconds, as Auerbach's overwhelming guitar pours forth, drowning out his cries and pushing the song to its aptly-named conclusion. There isn't a weak track in the bunch. I have actually seen women get up to dance to the catchy "Yearnin'." Another of my favorites is "Brooklyn Bound," with is driving guitar and haunting lyrics. This is an album of lasting importance from artists who will be around for years to come. What continues to surprise with every listen is that this music, created in the basement of an Ohio home by two very young men, resonates so profoundly with the gritty sounds of the Delta. These guys are good, very good - and they're only getting started. - Mike Kylis / Delusion of Adequacy

The Big Come-Up introduced the garage-grime and "white Hendrix" croon of The Sonics to the unholy strut of Junior Kimbrough's legendary guitar lines, fusing them into a spitting, spewing, 40-ton monster. Winners like "Heavy Soul" evoked the primal ballet of Fordzilla crushing unmanned Buicks, and when it wasn't busy flattening rides, still offered a glimpse of the delicate machinery under the hood with soul cuts like "I'll Be Your Man". - Pitchfork

Left Of The Dial - Best of 2002 (Big Come Up #3)
You probably won't find this at Best Buy, thank God. Finally something is overlooked by the mainstream, and it is magnificent music. Check this out if you want to delve into your darker side of minimalist R&B. It's really basic stuff, but you might have to buy it if you really want to enjoy something before you go to hell.

Auerbach and gangly funk drummer Patrick Carney are a twentysomething duo from Akron, Ohio, whose college-kid jam-band look and impassioned stranglehold on the blues make it clear this is neither retro hipsterism nor the post-punk tinkering of the White Stripes and company. They're not cool; they're just brilliant. - Dean Kuipers / LA Times

Infusing their fucked-up blues with the restless spirit of Son House and electrifying the whole mess with a charge dirty Detroit rock'n'rollness, Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney push the needles off the dial with their bare essentials racket. The Black Keys' debut crackles forth from your speakers and shakes its ass round the room like it's alive, as insistently persuasive as that ole devil-man himself, with its eerie reverberated hollerin, speaker-shredding distortion and those dang-she-done-me wrong sentiments. - Hugh Gulland / Bucketfull Of Brains UK

Fabulous cover, fabulous disc. First, the cover. A black and white photo of two men's faces, the one in front bespectacled, nervous and bug-eyed, the other a few feet behind serene and, maybe, furtive. These two guys are the Black Keys, and Rolling Stone has called The Big Come Up rock debut of 2002. Drummer Pat Carney is the frazzled tall guy, and his partner Dan Auerbach is the guitarist-singer who hollers out rawboned blues so swampy the music suggests these Akron, Ohio buys have been spending shitloads of money on their Mississippi blues record collection. Auerbach's ax is in overdrive all the time, indwelt by the spirit of blues legends Junior Kimbrough and Fred McDowell. But there is also a punk heart here, not just retro blood. Check out the Minutemen-inspired guitar that kicks off "Them Eyes" as well as a heavy boogie remake of the Beatles' "She Said, She Said". The sturdy funk in Carney's big bottomed beats buoy the college dorm humor on "Countdown". Auerbach whines drolly: "You stole my heart and damn near drove me mad/I gotta get back home to my mom and dad." The flatted thirds and sevenths come tight and fast on the album's 13 tracks, and it's only on the closer  "240 Years Before Your Time" that the Keys stretch out, transforming an instrumental, a rock-steady beat, some weird sample and guitar psychedelia into a Hendrix-ian mini-opus. - Lee Chung Horn / Betamusic

There are a couple of ways for current musicians to approach the blues: they can ape the actions of their forefathers, or they can try to find the same spark that inspired them. The Black Keys have left behind what is cultural about the blues, sticking instead to what is primal. They don't pretend that they're pimps or sharecroppers from the 1930s. They're two young white guys from Akron who groove like hell. The band's stripped-down, guitar-and-drums instrumentation and color-themed name invite obvious comparisons to fellow Midwesterners the White Stripes. But the Black Keys have rejected the temptation to rely on shtick or cute little uniforms. Instead of image, they rely more on soulful singing and sexy slink. The duo of Dan Auerbach on guitar and vocals and Patrick Carney on drums used a method when recording the album that they call "medium fidelity." The liner notes describe that technique as "equal parts broke-ass shit to equal parts hot-ass shit." That principle-keeping what retro elements sound cool while not being afraid to live in the 21st century-allows the Black Keys to achieve a rare feat. They capture a vintage spirit while still sounding fresh. - Brian J. Bowe / Creem Magazine

This is primal blues strung up from a tree like a skinned buck that's been bludgeoned by rampaging punk ruffians. Having picked up pointers on visits to the Mississippi Delta, this guitar-drums duo's sound is combines fiery blues raunch with avant-punk guitar experimentalism to make their debut album essential. - Doug Sheppard / Discoveries

Vintage is everything for this Akron, Ohio, duo, from its stripped-down, Exile On Main Street-meets-Fat Possum records sound to Dan Auerbach's asthmatic-filled-worker soul shouts to the faux-aged sleeve artwork. As with blues-skronk revivalists Jon Spencer and the White Stripes, purists may scoff. But these grooves are as woozy and funky as a hungover drive from Memphis down to Clarksdale and deep into the Delta.- Magnet

Two dudes from Akron, Ohio, with Beatles to burn and blues to spare, the Keys are six inches away from absolutely awesome. - Spin (8 star rating)

This is a gritty nasty slize of Blooze n Roll that is incredibly real, visceral and true. This is one of the best records I've been attacked by in a while. - Roctober

Akron has spawned the most compelling two-piece, hyper-primitive, blues-based rock band of the last five years. This is one of the five best records of 2002, and bass players everywhere should continue to grow nervous. - Chuck Klosterman / Village Voice

Gutbucket blues and raunchy rock that seem to come from Mississippi rather than an Akron basement. The Black Keys play with savagery and soul that are missing from most white blues musicians who've taken a stab at the genre. - Alternative Press (rating 8)

The Black Keys are putting mush mouthed sleaze back into the r'n'b rennaissance. It almost makes me want to return to 1971 where we can safely discuss "blackness" (or a lack of it) "authenticity" being of great importance to the Stones and their ilk back in the day. The Black Keys have a track called 'Heavy Soul' which is actually what it says it is. Paul Weller's album of the same name merely Claptonised music which had been filtered through white people once already (Spencer Davis Group, The Small Faces etc). No, this is basic drum and guitar encoded with Son House DNA, moving within that ol' unpredictable John Lee Hooker meter. It's a long way to the top if you wanna rock'n'roll, unless you live in Akron, in which case just keep drinking the water. - Steve Hanson / Ptolemaic Terrascope UK

For a white boy, Dan Auerbach sounds as black as Art Modell's heart. The Black Keys frontman sings as if he were sired by Jimi Hendrix, weaned on Wild Turkey in T-Model Ford's shotgun shack, then mentored by Mountain's Leslie West. The latter would explain why "Leavin' Trunk" sounds a lot like "Mississippi Queen," the other wo why this off-the-cuff blues scorcher is so damn good. Though the duo has been referred to as the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's retarded cousin, the Black Keys are far less a Caucasian caricature than Spencer and Co. The 22-year-old Auerbach has already made numerous trips to Mississippi, where he's performed with many of the Delta's legends in juke joints and shady watering holes. He's even slept on the floor of T-Model Ford's roach-infested home. The authenticity shows. Auerbach's voice is equal parts heartache and hellfire. He hollers with all the sass and sorrow of a drunk at last call, and his guitar playing is just as rambunctious -- going from fleet, foot-stompin' blues workouts to reverb-drenched garage-rock overdrive in a heartbeat. With backing from Patrick Carney, who pounds out sloshed, ramshackle rhythms on a broken drumkit, it all amounts to lots of weathered, world-weary thrills. Highlights include "Busted," a double shot of serrated soul; "Them Eyes," the Rolling Stones skinny-dipping in Muddy Waters; and "Countdown," a funky blues barnburner. The timing couldn't be better. Now that the White Stripes are on the tip of everybody's tongue and deconstructionist blues is all the rage, the Black Keys are primed for a breakout. And rightfully so. The Big Come Up is one of the finest albums -- local or otherwise -- that we've heard all year. - Jason Bracelin / Cleveland Scene

The Big Come Up swings, cuts and rocks like the best hill-country blues, even when they're covering the Beatles' "She Said She Said." Unlike the North Mississippi Allstars, another white-boy band trying to do this thing, there's nothing sweet or fey about the Black Keys; Auerbach has the kind of raspy, dark voice that's made for this sort of music. And the music? It's raw, greasy, scorching, harsh: You could fry bacon on the CD's surface. - Jay Babcock / LA Weekly

The Black Keys play stripped down, raw, vintage-style blues that could have been produced by Leonard and Phil Chess in the 1950's. But more than revisionists, the're full of their own swaggering self-confidence, soulful hollers and fuzz tone buzz. The Big Come Up, the first album by this two-piece powerhouse from Akron, Ohio, could be the best blues album in years. - Michael Kylis / Adequacy

This week's column is devoted to plucky statements--so the timid and the tepid can fuck right off. So can the
White Stripes. Yes, I said the White Stripes can fuck right off. Why? The Black Keys, that's why. On Friday, July 26, yet another two-person band took the stage and did the white-guy blues thing, but this duo--holy shit! is all I'm sayin'. Hailing from Akron, Ohio, the Black Keys has a drummer who can actually play the hell out of his drums, and bearded singer Dan Auerbach sings like crazy. - Kathleen Wilson / The Stranger

Two young guys from Akron, OH, just guitar and drums, went to Mississippi to learn from Fat Possum artist James "T-Model" Ford. They came back expert at bludgeoning the blues in a most satisfying way, no attempt at being authentic or even reverent, but able to fan the flame of an emotional core in each song. There are covers of "Leaving Trunk" and "She Said, She Said" which go well with their own "Heavy Soul" and, of course, "Do the Rump." - Rock & Rap Confidential

Auerbach and Carney are punks. Not the sad caricatures that the word clearly now implies, but rather they are punks in the pure and simple tradition of the term, caring nothing about popular convention and moving forward, doing what feels good and what feels right. And if finding out what feels right means stripping things right down to the real blues that spawned the whole rockroll culture from the git-go and then building everything up from there - then so be it. It sounds damn good to me. Thus Auerbach and Carney, starting from a baseline blues, tap into references ranging from the D. Boon Minutemen guitar that leads "Them Eyes" to the 60's era Cynic-al garage psychedelia "She Said, She Said", along the swamp blues path that CCR carved out ("Yearnin') and right on up the groove heavy scales climbed years ago by "Mr. Big Stuff" ("The Breaks"). It is a supreme tribute to the Black Keys that The Big Come Up never winds up mired in reverential mimicry. A keen ear for the ghostly strains of the blues that subtly haunt much of the diverse array of modern music allows them a wealth of inspiration that obviously feeds their personal reinvention of an age-old noise. - Kurt Hernon / Bangsheet

The Big Come Up, the Black Keys' debut album, just released on the Alive label is is quite simply one of the best American records you'll hear this year. By literally tapping the source - not unlike young Bob Dylan's pilgrimage to meet Woody Guthrie - Auerbach's experience gives the Black Keys an undeniable integrity. In Carney, who produced The Big Come Up, Auerbach has found his perfect counterpart. Auerbach's rustic beard and sunken eyes make him look like a Van Gogh self-portrait incarnate; Carney is fresh-faced with an indie Abe Lincoln physique. Auerbach's cousin is Robert Quine, influential punk guitarist best known for Richard Hell's Blank Generation; Carney's uncle is Ralph Carney, the horn player and longtime Tom Waits sideman. The pair grew up a half-block from one another. - Peter Relic / Cleveland Free Times & Phoenix New Times

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