Hipster, Total Hipster pt. 2

Soon I will have to dig up my moutsche wax there is so much hipster in me.  This post is in the hipster vein of vinyl and was a Christmas gift from my parents Ted and Donna.

On 180 GRAM vinyl The Black Keys-thickfreakness is a limited edition release. And it came with a free digital download of the album. And that is way more convenient than taking a record player with you when you travel.

Album Cover

Album back "artwork"

Inner sleeve

I would agree that the grease on the cover is some fantastic "thickfreakness".  As is the sound that these two make.  The White Stripes, The Black Keys.... bands like these it is amazing the depth of sound that only a few can make to me.  Some can say it is dirty or sloppy but I think that is what makes it sound more real, like it came from an earlier time.  A time when there wasn't auto-tune and people recorded together and not onto laptops in their living rooms one layer at a time.  Maybe that is just me being a romantic, longing for less produced pop and more heartfelt rock.  But hey a guy can dream can't he?  It isn't that I don't

like POP I certainly do.  That is why it is pop, it is popular, but sometimes you want something a little more authentic.

Track listing
No.
1.     "Thickfreakness"
2.     "Hard Row"
3.     "Set You Free"
4.     "Midnight in Her Eyes"
5.     "Have Love Will Travel"
6.     "Hurt Like Mine"
7.     "Everywhere I Go"
8.     "No Trust"
9.     "If You See Me"
10. "Hold Me in Your Arms"
11. "I Cry Alone"



It is in the inner sleeve that we learn that "all songs recorded and mixed december 2002 by patrick carney in akron ohio at studio 45 using his patented recording technique called 'medium fidelity'[...]"
Digging more on the interwebs tells us it was recorded in Patrick Carney's basement using an early 1980s Tascam 388 8-track recorder resulting in an older sounding sound. And an older sound is exactly what draws me to this I do believe.

Plain black, thick-assed vinyl

Some albums have some really fun images or thing with the actual vinyl itself, not this one.  True to the theme of stripped down and in your face, the album itself is just standard black and I find that completely appropriate for what it is.  An unapologetic fantastic rock album.  While there a similar sound (think we can agree most band have this) I think it is more a result of all the songs coming from a single 14 hour recording session.  I think that is add to the honesty of the recording.  The song to pick will be:




""Hold Me in Your Arms" by (of course) The Black Keys