:: Record Review

The Raconteurs

Consolers of the Lonely
(Warner Bros.; 2008)

Rating: 49%

Not since they made that video with Pee Wee Herman have the Raconteurs had any trace of a sense of humor. Not even Jim Jarmusch could loan enough aloof, smarmy giggles to the group, so they redid his video and then aligned with someone creepier. No matter; Consolers of the Lonely is sincere through and through, a heaping, raw pile—of roots rock or southern rock or rootsy southern ballads as grated through Detroit’s blandest pop-songwriter and his fortunately famous kinda-neo-garage pioneer of a friend? Yes, and it sucks. And they suck. And I don’t even know the bassist and the drummer, but together they suck. They suck because they have so noticeably been hornswoggled by Jack White’s stupid idea that stripping all the production experimentation, imperative lyricism, and archaism-as-adhesive from a full band sound, replacing all that with obvious, shiney everything, is a step closer to worthwhile accessibility.

As if to accent this conceit, the release of Consolers belched with bloated satisfaction, their newsletter reading, at its most excitable: “We wanted to get this record to fans, the press, radio, etc., all at the EXACT SAME TIME so that no one has an upper hand on anyone else regarding it’s availability, reception or perception…The Raconteurs would rather this release not be defined by it’s first weeks sales, pre-release promotion, or by someone defining it FOR YOU before you get to hear it.” The bitterness fouls me – a disappointment so scathing that it seems years and years since Jack White was actually a force to be reckoned with – I know; maybe if the album didn’t smell so achingly of self-importance, wasn’t so plain uninteresting, then all the ingots of anti-industry talk could smelt into something more. Broken Boy Soldiers (2006) at least carried an incomprehensible motive throughout its alternately dopey and catchy numbers, Brendan Bensen and Jack White struggling to play the avant ambassadors to radio rock while pillaging basic keys, cadences, and guitar tones and assuring us all that, no fear, it’s better to attack the establishment from within. Now we have their sophomore album sooner than expected and it is frankly, blearingly dull. From piano trolley “You Don’t Understand Me” to “Hold Up,” that waste of fiery anthems and fuzz-friendly wah, from the dundering gringo/douche hump of horns that basically plots out “The Switch and the Spur” to the troll of a love child between Steve Perry and U2 that’s “Rich Kid Blues” (fucking a), the whole is thin, grinning, ignorant. “… and I’m bored to tears” is right.

Or maybe the asinine lyric that fits better is “In the court of my heart your ignorance is treason.” Granted, White has never cradled his words in flourish, but the cookie-cutter tact he always maintained usually pulled rank because the electric guitar behind was so urgent. Plus, he never forgot his footing, playing with old amps and analog techniques instead of disarming his acts of discovery by giving in too boldly to all that work with Loretta Lynn and the Cold Mountain soundtrack and making little pretenses past the rivets and storming noise of a dying Michigan city. And God, was that straggly-haired connoisseur ever competent, earning the trust of legends through sheer eagerness to learn and to play and to push the boundaries by tightening them to a strangle. But now, do you hear that ringing in your ear? That’s the sound of a nice frequency dying: Icky Thump (2007) was the dirge and Consolers of the Lonely is the end (a fascinating death rattle in title only).

For not only is this album tired, its creators just seem so decidedly okay with that notion.
Because what keeps Consolers of the Lonely from being an outright shit affair is, predictably, the assembled chops of its musicians, a group never so much fussy as amicable, wide-eyed about the righteous licks and insensitive tempo shifts they solder together so tightly. Sprightly but studied piano lines keep the bass walking; southern-ish-istic horns accentuate rising melodies, which explode, as a matter of entelechy, manicured to hit every emotional cue possible; Brendan Benson and Jack White give bro hugs as they share restrained inklings to test the upper and lower boundaries of their register, snarling or whinnying or going all bassy in mathematically precise proportions; every song is built from and introduced by some pertly punched out riff, the pieces congeal for a louder verse and a loudest chorus, then the bridge is usually meant to emphasize some sort of killer, pedal-mewling solo or remind the listener of all that aleatoric white noise they had there at the beginning of the song (And are you really going to pump the already bloated songs with dumb crap like people laughing and congregating? Are you trying to dramatize the loneliness of the band, still playing their heart out in the middle of the crowded room? Fuck. That.) because this album must treat its listeners as if they have no attention span—call it empathy, call it ritual—too sleek and mouth-breathing to be much more interesting than during each immediate, successive moment when the previous moment is blanched and the stomach recognizes the method of the band before the head can.

And the thing’s also way too fucking long, especially when, by “Pull This Blanket Off,” the vocal and piano lines are, recognizably lifted from somewhere else or not, only ad hoc interludes, place-holders, old hat nothings. There is very little worse than that, little more infuriating than a good, if not great, musician finally becoming irretrievably and contentedly average.

I just never thought I’d say it, but: I miss you, Meg White. I miss you.