Part 3: Brothers by The Black Keys
Design heads, how much time have you wasted skipping album tracks whilst trying to work? I know, right? The importance of being able to play an album aaaaallll the damn way through is rarely thought about or mentioned. I know I’ve spent a lot of time choosing the right music when I could have been designing (hence the birth of this blog series). Well, with The Black Keys there isn’t much skipping to be done.
2010’s Brothers is another slice of blues infused rock from the Ohio duo. For two people they make a hell of a racket. But a good racket of course. Brothers is probably my favourite Black Keys album, it has a maturity and a sense of dark truth about it. Over the years the pair have become accomplished musicians and although I like the raw, gritty, garage band sound of the early stuff, Brothers manages to throw back to that at times while also showing how they’ve grown musically.
The artwork is simple but dark and effective. There’s no denying its relationship to the music, so designers take note. The typography and design are a throw back to a dusty old bar where people spill their sorrows over heavy guitars, sitting for hours with sippin’ whiskey before heading out into the deserted night.
