The Black Keys "Attack and Release" the Grungy Blues

The Black Keys album "Attack and Release," is a blues rock acid trip gone dark and dreary. This does give you high moments in the "look at reflections of your past in some tears" sort of way, but the garage bar blues may be too heavy for some to handle.

Would I buy this album? I'd take it on a sale, sure; ninety-five cents?

My favorite song ended up being the final bookend of "Things Ain't Like They Used To Be." My thoughts during all of the songs can be read below.

"All You Ever Wanted": Light your cigarettes and open your hymnals to the book of the road. A slow ramble along that reminds me of hot asphalt in the desert sun and empty pools and cheap inns. Goes from real quiet to really churched up when the organ blows some screams out of its pipes at the end. Good start to the album, neither here nor there in terms of being great.

"I Got Mine": Old school bar in your garage band music or maybe a Beeronade stand on the side of the cracked highway has some misfits hanging out with a guitar. Crunchy, with vocals slightly distorted against the microphone, and then it breaks into a hazy trip, before cracking you back into the chorus of "I Got Mine." Tap your foot along, this is an okay song.

"Strange Times": This time it feels like the garage band version of Muse with piano bounces instead of epic scoped opera guitars. Dull with an okay chorus having the ghost choir effects and pian-o-line.

"Psychotic Girl": Echo vocals with drum and bass meets banjo. This one goes for a haunted house ride vibe or perhaps better suited a haunted bar/ diner with cigarette smoke and spirits hard to decipher between. A lazy listen along for bluesy, acid ballad fans.

"Lies": Another blues rock ballad, heavy on the blues: 'I got a stone where my heart should be, and nothing I do will make you love me." The main downside to this music is if you are on drugs this could take it in a bad direction and have you crying and trying to claw off your skin. "I want to die without pain, all this deception I just can't maintain." Good strong stuff for the right moment.

"Remember When (Side A)": Now we've gotten so down into the blues that we are a fly floating in a puddle, half alive and daydreaming that we are surfing at the beach. A soft death lullaby. The fly is perhaps doing the backing vocals, fairly cool.

"Remember When (Side B)": The B side is a Kinks style rock out. Someone scooped the fly out and gave him some mouth to mouth, time to go find some poop! I liked the A side better. By the way, the songs have nothing to do with flies, that's just my weird descriptors.

"Same Old Thing": They whip out the stoner flutes for this one and do some caveman "hooing." Meh, blah, blah.

"So He Won't Break": If a singer like the gone to the beyond Amy Winehouse were a bearded man, this might be a blues rock for he/she to groove to. It is a bit of a sound grind at this point, but decent track.

"Oceans & Streams": One level catchier than the old codgers still getting together to play at the dive bar.

"Things Ain't Like They Used To Be": It's soaked in the blues, but has some pop and even 80s ballad vibe deep in there, which makes the flow especially good and dramatic, possibly due to the successfully lyrical rhyme scheme. In the vein of what this album is about this is the one to bleed out too. Good stuff, best song on the album.