Consolers of the Lonely

iTunes Review

The Raconteurs’ second album reflects the group’s paradoxical interests in rough-cut rockers and their thoughtful appraisal of rock music’s storied history. This is, after all, a collaboration between the harsh modern blues of White Stripes’ Jack White and power-pop songwriter Brendan Benson. There’s studio chatter and feedback, tough shards of power chord guitars, and lots of sass balanced out with well-produced stereophonic guitars, tinkering keyboards, and layers of carefully leveled harmony vocals. The title track is deliberately half-baked, an unfinished riff reveling in its rawness, but “You Don’t Understand Me” is a heartfelt piano shuffle. “The Switch and the Spur” reflects a soft psychedelic twist with horns, quickly followed up with the early-‘70s guitar wah-wah and schoolyard chant of “Hold Up.” Slide-blues highlights “Top Yourself,” another ‘70s-influenced tune that along with the refried boogie of “Attention” and organ-driven Southern rock of “Rich Kid Blues” wouldn’t be out of place on a Black Crowes album, while “Five On the Five” goes for the trademark White Stripes garage-rock crunch.