The Black Keys Fan Lounge » live show

The Black Keys’ New Live Show 2010

brucini — Fri, 21 May 2010 03:00:59 +0000

The speculation regarding changes to The Black Keys’ “live show” has ended. Dan and Pat will be joined on stage for the upcoming tour with two new members, at least for some of the tracks. A new set list will also be featured incorporating new material from the Brothers album.

The Black Keys noted changes would occur in a Facebook update some time ago. The change was flagged because much of the material on the new Brothers album is defined by the orchestration of piano, drums and bass which is at the core of the song development. Reflecting or re-creating the recorded sound therefore necessarily posed some challenges within a live environment.

As Dan Auerbach recently commented:

We might bring out a couple of people to play a few of songs with us,” he said. “The majority of the set will still be two-piece, but [we'll] have a couple of guys come out because we really like a lot of the arrangements on the record and it would be fun to be able to do those live instead of having to strip down. We’ve got two guys who helped us with the live Blakroc stuff, and we became friends with. Leon Michels, a keyboardist and Nick Movshon on bass — they’re pretty tight.

Michels and Movshon run Truth & Soul records. They also play in a group called El Michels Affair and recently released an album of Wu Tang Clan instrumentals.

Fans will recognise them from the two performances of Blakroc tracks live on the Fallon and Letterman shows in late-2009.

The Black Keys, of course, are performing Tuesday 25 May, 2010, on The David Letterman show and Wednesday 26 May, 2010, on The Jimmy Fallon show. It will be interesting to see if the new band members join them for these shows and which songs they play – probably a different song on each as they did with Blakroc. Most likely it will be the current single Tighten Up and Next Girl.

The set list for the live show will also change with essentially three parts to it. Dan and Pat for the first and third parts and joined by Michels and Movshon for the second Brothers-oriented set. At least, his is how the breakdown of the show went for the first performance of the new set list and band line up at the free Housing Works Bookshop show on 19 May, 2010.

Housing Works Bookshop & Cafe show – “Too Afraid To love You”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecAOsRx7fbI

New Set List:

Set list photo courtesy of e.Conrad’s Flickr. Post hat tip to Forum member kepnerb.

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The Black Keys Fantasy Live Show

brucini — Sun, 09 May 2010 02:13:58 +0000

There’s been a lot of chatter on the fan Forum ever since The Black Keys mentioned on their Facebook page that there would be “changes in the live show”. Fans have only ever known two guys on stage rockin hard.

Irrespective of how the ‘Keys perform their songs live (announcement to be made very shortly), there are so many possibilities of how things could turn out including their set lists. This all got me thinking about what my fantasy Black Keys gig would be like.

If the ‘Keys could play anything to please you live what would it be? What would your fantasy Black Keys live show consist of?

Every fan hopes they’ll play their favourite songs. Realistically a band can never please everyone, so they’re probably better off trying to get some sort of compromise between keeping themselves happy and most of the audience. Live shows should be different to the album. It was a point emphasised by Tchad Blake, who mixed Brothers, and has seemingly been embraced more and more by the band. Dan’s ‘Keep It Hid’ record was certainly a case in point when played live.

Forgetting a past dream, which is still an ultimate fantasy gig, here’s how I envisage a show panning out. Basically, it centres on a show they never play, or rather songs and elements of their career, looking forward and back – taking some of those elements and pushing the boundaries even further and in so doing highlighting the musicality and lyrical strength of the band. I don’t want to just hear the fuzzed out banging tunes every time – I’ve seen enough of those shows. I’d like to think I’ve moved on as I’ve got older just like the band has.

Maybe some inspired festival booker or promoter could talk the band into this type of show? No doubt it might be a few years off as a one off retrospective/showcase or All Tomorrows Parties-type show.

My fantasy show would be broken into three parts.

It would start with a set of Blakroc instrumentals to ease the crowd in. I’m surprised the band hasn’t experimented with more instrumentals generally. I’d hope Gil Scott Heron might come on for some tracks. Though he didn’t appear on the Blakroc release if you’ve listened to his new album or past ones you’ll get a sense of what could be possible if the Black Keys really opened up. It could be something pushing the boundaries of, what I’d call, blues-beat tracks.

Chulahoma. This would be the second set. If just once the band would play these tracks live. It’s a perfect segue into more rockin but mid-tempo tracks. Straight up play the album through would be sweet as.

The final set would feature the slow soul drenched Brothers tracks. No doubt the concert just like the album would leave everyone wanting more – just how it should be. If anything, after a few listens, I wish Dan and Pat had actually pushed their soul tracks even further. No doubt there were plenty surprised faces at their record label when they first played the new cuts. Backed with further musicians and instrumentation, no doubt the hope despair redemption of the songs will be accentuated.

The Setlist:

First set

Hope You’re Happy

On The Vista

Stay Off The Fuckin Flowers

Aint Nothing Like You (Hoochie Coo)

Hard Times

Dollaz and Sense

Why Can’t I Forget Him

WhaT You Do To Me

Second set

Keep Your Hands Off Her

Have Mercy on Me

Work Me

Meet Me in the City

Nobody But You

My Mind is Ramblin’

Third Set

The Only One

Too Afraid to Love You

Ten Cent Pistol

Sinister Kid

The Go Getter

I’m Not the One

Unknown Brother

These Days

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Video: The Black Keys Live @ Lola’s Room, Portland, USA, 2003

brucini — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 00:50:57 +0000

Archival live video footage of The Black Keys pre-2004 is relatively rare. Now days you can invariably find video footage of every live show posted soon after the event. So when this 2003 show at Lola’s Room was recently uploaded to YouTube by OscarTripe, The Black Keys Fan Lounge had to find out more. OscarTripe explains below how he came to record this show.

What’s great about these early recordings is not just the fact they are in a small room, early in the band’s career, but the fact they are taken on a proper video camera often side of stage with good sound quality. Most stuff that fan’s take now days is from a camera phone being waved in the air with poor sound quality.

Dedicated fans of any band are archivists by default. Whether it be through the photos they take, the recollections they publish or the autographs and memorabilia they collect. Respect to all those who have and do make the effort. Just imagine if Alan Lomax had had access to video/film back in the day – he was just one big, serious fan at the end of the day.

The Black Keys Fan Lounge also recently chronicled fan Chris Johnson’s 2003 video archive of the band.

Please be aware of The Black Keys’ current taping policy doesn’t include videoing shows. Strangely the link to this policy has been removed from the new website upgrade.

OscarTripe explains how he came to video this 2003 show and how only now fans are getting to see it:

Back in the summer of 2003 I was friendly with the ‘Keys. They’d stayed with me on a recent trip through Portland (opening for Sleater Kinney at the Crystal Ballroom) and their tour manager was an old pal of mine.
This time they were headlining their own show at Lola’s Room, a club space directly below the Crystal.
I’d recently picked up a mini DV camera and brought it with me to the show to test it out. Dan and Patrick were fine with me filming, and in fact I recall Dan telling me that he taped the odd show himself.
The boys took the stage very early for some reason—9 PM with no opening act. The crowd was small (30-40) but ravenous.
Between the newness of the camera, my lousy photography skills and all the shots of Old Crow I did with Patrick it’s a wonder the video turned out at all. But I was delighted to find the footage while going through some old tapes recently and am happy to share it with you all.

Videos of songs in set list order:

Busted

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzYDrLRm6sU

Them Eyes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBDxPxLbvhU

Set You Free

www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSdRGjHvS34

Have Love Will Travel

www.youtube.com/watch?v=apgkwBDgEyk

I’ll Be Your Man

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDMOiX6k6WI

No Trust

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDxYBU5P2l4

No Fun

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Aa7icr91Zw

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Black Keys Live Show Reviewers Needed

brucini — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 08:40:34 +0000

This is a shout out primarily to anyone going to the Black Keys sold out Terminal 5 shows in New York this week, 6 and 7 February.

Would be great for someone to write a review of the New York show(s) and any Black Keys shows or new Dan Auerbach solo shows and submit it and some photos to this blog.

Leave a comment in this post and I’ll be in contact.

The McCarren Pool show last year was the band’s biggest ever headlining show. Some 4800 fans turned out. It was something of a tipping point in the band’s popularity. It will therefore be interesting to see how NYC represents in 2009.

On a general note, I’m always happy to accept reviews, content, news, ideas, feedback from ‘Keys fans on any subject.

Content submitted will have to be exclusive to this site. As the saying goes, publication will be at the discretion of the Editor.

There’s no better way to make the site better than by writing the articles your self!

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Black Keys Live Concert Photos

brucini — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 01:17:05 +0000

I’ve recently added all my photos of The Black Keys to Flickr. You can see them all here and a sample of them cascading down the side of this blog.

My photos are by no means the best, amateur equipment under the low light doesn’t help, but they give a feel for a Sydney concert I went to.

I thought I’d list a few links to some of the better dedicated Black Keys sets on Flickr:

- cadd’s photo set from a 2006 live gig

- cadd’s 2007 Glasgow live set

- beezeebeebee’s photo set (50+ images)

- jberg’s NYC photo set

- marianne’s photo set from an amsterdam show

- matthiaskrueger1′s set of knust germany show photos

Have you got some awesome photos of the band? Why not put them on Flickr so all fans can see them?

Here’s my favourite photo of Pat below. There’s something about the stage lights, drumming frenzy and punters’ heads in the foreground that sum up a concert moment.

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The Black Keys "I'm Glad" Live in Sydney

brucini — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 04:54:13 +0000

Apologies for the thrushy sound near the end, the boys were just rockin’ out too loud for my poor recording equipment (read: camera). For me this track was a highlight of the show.

This is of course a Captain Beefheart cover which they also released as a free mp3 via their Myspace page a while ago.