Music Review: The Raconteurs, “Consolers of the Lonely” (****)
Thanks to outsized expectations and the slightly subdued power-pop they purveyed, The Raconteurs were met with muted praise for 2006’s “Broken Boy Soldiers.” The supergroup delivered a solid approximation of 1970s rock radio, but it was neither as crunchy and bizarre as Jack White’s work with the White Stripes nor as unabashedly melodic as Brendan Benson’s solo discs. But “Consolers of the Lonely” is a completely different animal: a beast constructed from fat hooks and muscular playing that proves The Raconteurs are no mere alt-rock Traveling Wilburys outfit.
Not much air separates “Consolers of the Lonely” from the lysergic stomps and freaky melodramas of the White Stripes’ “Icky Thump.” White and Benson seem melded together here, and the twin leaders punch hard on the slippery opening title track and fast jabber of “Salute Your Solution.” Even slower songs such as “You Don’t Understand Me” sound more committed this time around, and the “Exile on Main Street” visitations “Old Enough” and “Pull This Blanket Off” don’t sound like playing Confederate dress-up.
Elsewhere, the grand tango-rock of the Stripes’ “Conquest” echoes in the magnificent horn-drenched, Ennio Morricone-style centerpiece, “The Switch and the Spur,” in which the full breadth of The Raconteurs’ musical power and eccentricity is brought to bear. The Raconteurs sound fully committed on “Consolers of the Lonely,” rocking at top potential and prepared to be a complete encyclopedia entry, not just a footnote.
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