The Raconteurs - Consolers of the Lonely

Warner Bros. Records 2008

6/10

Best Track: "Rich Kid Blues"

Worst Track" "The Switch and the Spur"

So the Raconteurs inexplicably rushed the release of Consolers of the Lonely by a few weeks. That was big enough news. The even bigger news is that Jack White and Brendan Benson would have been better off working on it in the studio a bit more. Sometimes, good things come to those who wait. Sadly, Consolers is not one of those good things. Mediocre thing maybe, but certainly not a good thing.

Consolers of the Lonely reaches for a bluesy-rock bliss of melding song construction genius with solid guitars. It shouldn’t be a stretch. Brendan Benson is a multi-talented musician and Jack White is the closest thing this generation has to a musical genius. Sadly though, the only thing that needs consoling is the disappointed legion of Raconteurs fans.

The raw material on the album is, for the most part, the same inspired genius that led The Raconteurs’ debut Broken Boy Soldiers to become a hit record. The problem is, that genius gets obscured by rushed vocal mastering in songs, particularly the earlier tracks with “Salute Your Solution” as the worst offender. Add to the fact that Jack White’s already weak singing ability when he’s not half-screaming is spotlighted and the vocals throughout this album lead to a slight nail on a chalkboard feeling.

What saves this album is the classic rock influences that run in veins deeper than a simple name check. “Rich Kid Blues” takes the sound style of Led Zeppelin and merges it with the prog-rock sound of groups like Rush. Yes, The Raconteurs were just compared to two legendary rock bands. But, don’t worry. Those comparisons are few.

Usually, the sound just comes across flat and even sounding more like Dispatch than any other act. The jam band sound is nice at points, but when most songs particularly “The Switch and the Spur” and “You Don’t Understand Me” inexplicably fall into a jam band groove then things are going wrong. Jack White sounds like he’s auditioning for Widespread Panic and Benson is just chilling somewhere in the back of the van.

By the time Consolers of the Lonely closes, the flaws of this album start to look like mos rock albums of the past few years. They fall into a groove early with the sound of the last album showing through and the band trying to expand their sound. The sonic expansion is agonizingly slow and leaves the band sounding fatigued by the end with minimal accomplishment.

It’s not that Consolers of the Lonely is a bad album. There are some real bright spots on it, especially in the back half of the disc. But the rushed feeling of the production hurt the record and with only a month or so between recording and final packaging, there just wasn’t enough time to polish this into any sort of coherence. It’s just frustrating to see such talented men put out an album beneath what they are capable of achieving.

The Raconteurs - "Rich Kid Blues"

- Garrett Lyons