The Black Keys: Peaches!, Growth & Live Performances | Apple Music

0:00 looking back like what's your relationship to not only like sort of legacy

0:04 but like the band that you were then and the band that you are now?

0:09 I mean I think we have a real benefit

0:13 to our current situations cuz we're a better band now.

0:16 Yeah.

0:16 Sure.

0:17 than we were when we first started.

0:19 It was fun as hell and we were able to like basically start at single a ball

0:24 and work our way up the system.

0:25 And um our first record though it's special.

0:29 It's something that we could never make again.

0:31 We couldn't I didn't even know how to play the drums when we made the record.

0:35 We We didn't know how to mix it and we did it ourselves.

0:37 We didn't know how to record it.

0:38 We didn't know how how to really put songs together.

0:41 We were figuring it out.

0:42 And there's like there's like just something about you can you

0:45 if you're want to get into the Black Keys and you follow,

0:48 you can see you can really hear a band

0:49 kind of go through it all, you know, and um

0:54 I think that's part of it.

0:54 But I I I think here we are, you know,

0:56 25 years into our career and playing our best shows we've ever played.

0:59 So, uh maybe they're, you know, we're not playing Madison Square Garden.

1:04 It's probably it's for the best.

1:05 It's probably for the best.

1:06 Probably for the best.

1:08 Um but I mean, we have done it.

1:12 Yeah.

1:11 And I definitely can tell you we've had more fun in the last

1:14 couple days playing shows than we have on that first arena tour.

1:18 Stressed the living out of us.

1:20 We made a lot of money though, but it was very stressful.

1:25 Listening to Peaches in full,

1:26 there is this like real visceral like sense of catharsis for you guys.

1:30 Like listening to this record, it does feel like this is the album

1:33 that you guys like needed to make needed to make.

1:37 Um

1:37 yeah, I mean it wasn't really like the intention wasn't really to make an album.

1:40 You know, we we' had this idea to do a follow-up to Delta Cream for a long time,

1:44 like since we basically since we made it.

1:47 Um, we had a whole separate list of songs.

1:50 I had some, Dan had some,

1:51 but at the end of the day last year, we found ourselves,

1:55 um, we were supposed to be going to Latin

1:57 America on a tour and Dan's father got really sick.

2:00 He got diagnosed with terminal, um, cancer.

2:03 So, we cleared schedule so that we could be

2:06 home and Dan could be close to his father.

2:07 And so, there was a period of time when it was just getting,

2:10 you know, was getting very heavy.

2:11 And I I suggested maybe we should get in the studio

2:15 for a couple hours a day and just cut some stuff.

2:18 I I mean just not even with the intention of putting anything out,

2:21 just like I need to blow off some steam.

2:23 I need to get out of the house.

2:24 Exactly.

2:25 Yeah.

2:26 So we called our buddies from from Mississippi,

2:29 Kenny Brown, Jimbo Matthysse, Eric Deon.

2:31 Eric used to play bass for team Ford and Junior Kimbro and Arl Burnside.

2:36 And Jimbo's played with everybody.

2:38 and Kenny Brown is on some of our favorite albums of all time,

2:41 Hill Country Blues Records and and we we invited him up.

2:44 I I had a list of songs that I'd sort of been like keeping and um you know,

2:51 just songs I I would hear and I think that might

2:53 be fun to play one day or something, you know.

2:54 And yeah, he had he had a whole separate list of songs of what

2:57 that he just busted out and like this is what I want to do.

3:01 So, we just sat down in the room.

3:02 No one had really heard the songs before.

3:04 I didn't even reference them.

3:06 I just got the lyric sheets, tried to remember the chords,

3:10 and then we would just play them on the spot.

3:11 And you're pulling from like deep cuts,

3:13 archival footage of some of these bands

3:14 that like Good luck trying to find the 45.

3:16 Like you're you're find you're trying to find

3:18 these like lost treasures for the most part.

3:20 Yeah.

3:20 I mean, uh, some of it stems from us like collecting records,

3:24 you know, collecting 45s.

3:25 Others just like old blues songs I've loved.

3:28 Some of her like newer songs that I I didn't know about until recently,

3:32 you know, and uh, but they could just kind of ran the gamut.

3:35 But the the but the the thing that connected

3:38 them was that we'd never tried to play them or

3:42 most of us didn't most of us didn't know.

3:44 I never heard like the original versions of like

3:47 You Got to Lose She Does It Right.

3:49 Honestly, till after we had finished the album.

3:51 And so we recorded these songs.

3:53 And when we recorded, we didn't listen back to playback.

3:56 We would just record a song in the same room, right?

3:58 And we'd get through it and we'd be like, "That was fun.

4:00 Let's try another one."

4:01 And we just did that for a few days and then we'd never listen to it

4:04 for months.

4:05 Yeah, we might check it just to like

4:06 see that everything was there at some point.

4:09 We weren't like critically listening at all and then honestly,

4:12 you know, we we did that and um Dance Father Chuck ended up passing soon after

4:17 we finished tracking and and then it was

4:21 kind of straight into promoting No Rain, No Flowers.

4:24 So, so it wasn't until that tour was pretty much kind of wrapping up um that we

4:30 sat down in the studio and like started trying

4:33 to mix what was there, see what was there,

4:34 just cuz we had nothing to do.

4:36 And

4:36 Dan, actually Dan was producing some stuff and I would go over

4:38 to the the studio into the other room and just start fiddling around.

4:43 And then after a couple days, uh

4:47 I would pop over and be like, "Yeah, that sounds good.

4:49 That sounds good.

4:51 Hey, you're not bad at this.

4:52 You're pretty all right at this." We did that.

4:54 Yeah, he kept he would come over and be like, "Yeah, yeah, it's great.

4:56 Do this, this, do this." And then so eventually after like three weeks of that,

5:00 we had a record done.

5:02 It was cool.

5:03 It's actually the perfect way to come down from a tour cuz

5:05 it wasn't like now I'm just at home, have nothing to do.

5:06 I was like going to a job, you know, showing up eating lunch with

5:11 uh the dudes and Tom from Receable.

5:15 Yeah.

5:15 And Tom from accounts uh and um Yeah.

5:18 And it was cool.

5:18 So then, you know, we I think we maybe around that time

5:24 that we we we wanted to use another William Eglesson photo.

5:27 So we found the cuz we did feel like there was a connection to the dub record.

5:31 Clearly

5:32 the fact that you guys got the photo and it does look

5:34 like two bookends of this really important chapter in American musical history.

5:39 It's like, yeah, when Pat found that that photo, um,

5:42 it just felt like it was instantly, oh, that's it.

5:44 That's it.

5:45 This is meant to be.

5:46 You know,

5:46 decisions made for you.

5:47 we got an accidental album and there's the cover

5:49 and like great we don't even think about it.

5:52 Everything just got wrapped up in

5:54 it's like the big rusted out Coca-Cola logo on both

5:56 of the album covers is like I just love it so much.

5:59 And the funny thing is we actually had to like write to get approval

6:04 from Coca-Cola.

6:05 Uhhuh.

6:06 You think you might get like free Coke for a minute, but No.

6:10 No.

6:10 When you guys were actually like making like the decision to All right.

6:14 Well, let's let's do this.

6:16 Were you looking back and I don't know being

6:18 able to reinterpret these artists and reinterpret these songs?

6:21 Did it give you a sense of like abstraction

6:23 of not having to like get in the studio

6:25 and write new work and also kind of process

6:27 what you were going through and being like,

6:28 you know what, maybe it's just easier if

6:29 I let somebody else do the talking for this?

6:32 We just put our own spin on it instantly in the moment.

6:35 We almost got something that sounded more like us than

6:39 sure if we would shed it on something brand new.

6:41 I feel like it's truer to like who we are and almost sounds

6:45 more like uh the first records that we made than anything we've made since

6:49 those early records.

6:50 I mean there was kind of like just

6:51 a necessity to get stuff recorded and get it out.

6:54 We had no we didn't have any money right

6:56 to I mean we could sit around and fiddle

6:58 with something but it wasn't necessarily going to sound better.

7:00 It just would be different.

7:00 And but I do think that, you know,

7:04 like the real essence of the of the of the sound

7:07 of the record and the intention is it had it

7:09 was like I almost feel like Dan was like subliminally

7:12 compiling like a record that his dad would want to hear.

7:16 His dad was a super big music fan,

7:18 big supporter of Dan's career and of our career and was,

7:22 you know, like integral part of the band existing.

7:26 So I think like yeah he's an old hippie like live music fan

7:30 dealer too like antique dealer Americana folk art outsider art

7:34 he taught us about you know art and music and keeping it raw and um

7:41 that was that was the that he loved and he loved to go see live music.

7:45 He loved live performances and this record is that.

7:50 Yeah.

7:49 You know it's all of that.

7:52 Yeah.

7:51 And that's why we uh you know we dedicated it to him.

7:54 Also, I just feel like what you guys are planning to do

7:56 this with this album and kind of put yourself closer to the audience is,

8:01 I think, something that speaks to your origins,

8:03 the intention, and sort of like what we desperately need.

8:07 I think, you know, and and I mean,

8:08 the guys we're taking on the road are are all like kind of monster musicians,

8:13 but in a very specific way where like on Jimbo's work that he's done,

8:18 he's always embraced, you know, like flaws and quirks.

8:22 And same with same with Eric, you know,

8:23 he's like a master of a very unusual style of blues music, you know, and

8:30 and Eric locks in with Pat in a very special way because

8:33 Eric would set it on the same stuff that I did.

8:36 Junior Kimbro.

8:36 Yeah.

8:37 We both were obsessed at about the same age and dedicated our lives to that.

8:42 So, it's like to hear Eric play with Pat, it's it's a special thing

8:46 because my drumming I didn't really start drumming

8:48 at all till I started playing with Dan.

8:51 My whole drumming is just influenced really by uh dance playing.

8:56 Mhm.

8:56 So I think it's coming from the same spot as Eric.

8:58 So it's great to be there.

8:59 And I think that that's it like with being able to play Howland for you and Gold

9:02 on the Ceiling and all the songs with this band

9:05 and just kind of like lean into the swing, lean into the groove, let the songs

9:09 extend the songs, jam them out,

9:12 have have Little Barry with us playing guitar.

9:15 Um it's it's it's like kind of rearranged our brains and um I feel

9:21 like you know we've only played a couple shows so far on the tour,

9:25 but they feel like maybe the best shows we've ever played to be honest

9:29 because it's the first time you know like our trajectory was you know we

9:32 were two dudes in a van and then you know slowly after years and years

9:37 that things started growing and we were in a bus but when we finally like

9:42 kind of started blowing up like it was like We we had a light show.

9:46 We had we were playing arenas and it was

9:48 like we didn't ever get to the spot ever

9:50 where we were like in had an extended band

9:53 and were able to just kind of settle into it.

9:56 It was like always high pressure.

9:58 It was like here it is.

9:59 The first time we played as a four piece band.

10:02 Um aside from one little like benefit thing in a bookstore in New York,

10:05 our first real gig was uh opening for Pearl Jam at Madison Square Garden.

10:10 Oh, casual.

10:11 Like c just like casual casual.

10:12 was the first time you played with a bass player live with a bass player.

10:15 I mean, you had to get the James Dolan like seal of approval.

10:18 Like it was it's like it's wild to think that that

10:21 we had to pay him so his hand didn't open the show.

10:24 Yeah, that's it.

10:24 But I mean to think about like not having control over

10:26 those things in such like a I don't know breakneck amount of time.

10:30 It does feel like you guys are going back to the things you could control.

10:34 I mean, we had control over it,

10:35 but it was not like it wasn't like it was it was different.

10:40 It was just like we got to do this, we got to put on this thing

10:43 and now it's like it just you know it

10:46 feels like um you know the approach is different.

10:50 It's like the you know uh we've been

10:53 able to you know we kept production like lights

10:57 and stuff in a way where it's really aesthetically

10:59 pleasing but the show isn't dictated by the production.

11:02 Yeah.

11:02 you know, and I think that you can get wrapped

11:04 up in this stuff and I think we're just trying

11:06 to settle into a spot in our career where it's

11:09 exciting for us and an enjoyable thing for the fans.

11:11 So, um, that's the way forward, you know, and so we've only played three shows,

11:17 but I do think like Dan said,

11:19 they're they're three of the best shows we've ever played.

11:21 From what I've seen so far, I'm like have to agree with you.

11:23 Like, also the shows of the the longest shows we've ever played,

11:26 you know, and we're doing it without even thinking.

11:30 It doesn't even feel like it.

11:32 You know what I mean?

11:33 We used to have trouble playing long shows and now

11:35 we're like going over two hours and it's like no thing.

11:39 It's it's crazy for us.

11:41 Yeah.

11:41 You guys are just in the flow of it all.

11:43 We're in the zone and it's it feels really good.

11:45 I mean, I could tell like the the time that I spent with the record,

11:48 it does feel like I don't know,

11:50 like I said, like how it does feel in conversation with Delta,

11:52 but it does also feel very much in conversation with like the origins

11:56 of the band.

11:57 And uh I mean do you think you could have put out an album like this 2

12:01 or 3 years ago on your terms with the way that you want to do these live shows?

12:07 We did.

12:07 We did Delta Cream and we and that's like

12:09 almost like a trans North Mississippi Hill Country Blues record,

12:14 you know, but that was a turning point, you know, when we made that album.

12:18 It was a similar kind of circumstance.

12:20 It wasn't like an intended album.

12:22 It was Dan was producing a a record for his record label,

12:26 Easy Eye Sound, uh for Robert Finley.

12:30 Yeah.

12:30 And it was right when we finished the Let's Rock tour.

12:32 And we So we just did our first arena tour in 5 years.

12:35 And we had been home for maybe a week

12:37 and Dan called me on like um a Wednesday night,

12:41 are you free tomorrow and Friday?

12:43 Do you want to come in and record with uh Kenny Brown,

12:45 who I never had met, and Eric had never met.

12:48 And so I said, "Sure." We went in there

12:50 and we just threw down what became that record.

12:54 But once again, Kenny Brown is our hero.

12:56 Like to like when Pat and I first met um we were both into way different music.

13:02 But when I went over to his house, I saw that he had a Arl Burnside 45.

13:07 Sure.

13:06 And it was like the only blues thing he really knew.

13:08 And I was like, "Oh, you know, Arl Burnside.

13:11 Kenny Brown's on that.

13:11 Kenny Brown's on that record." And it's like so from our very

13:15 first days playing music when we were 16 and 17 that was he was there

13:19 with that record we we tracked it and uh then it was like the holidays

13:22 and then co happened and oh man and it was like it was the same thing

13:26 it was like summer 2020 and we listened back and we're like this could be

13:33 cool and so we sent it to Chad Blake who mixed that and there we go.

13:38 That was like and it was it was such a a such

13:42 a cool thing because it was like this is like not an intended album.

13:46 It's It's one of my favorite releases we've ever put out

13:48 and you know and I think it kind of showed us like

13:53 we can kind of just do whatever uh whatever we want you

13:57 know as long as we're enjoying it you know and you know

13:59 I think it signifies you know certain type of fan and deep

14:02 our base like you know this is kind of where our head

14:06 is at most of the time you know I think it's still

14:09 it's still a lot of fun to write a song that's like a hit.

14:13 Yeah, of course.

14:14 You know, um and it's cool to do that, but I

14:16 think uh it's cool to have those, but you know,

14:20 I think like the other night we played uh the song Just Couldn't Time Me Down,

14:24 a song off of um Rubber Factory.

14:27 We haven't played it in maybe, I don't know, 15 years.

14:29 But that was exciting, you know,

14:31 to like to get out there and pull up one of these songs

14:34 that we made as a two-piece that we haven't touched in almost two decades.

14:37 And like we got it together in like literally 30 seconds.

14:41 the whole band was just it was just like they're just like

14:44 we can start throwing stuff from the catalog out there on stage and having fun

14:48 and I'm sure the audience I mean you're talking

14:50 about the fans these people 14 albums in you

14:52 know 20 years on like this that's a treat for them you know what I mean like

14:56 it's a treat for us it's a treat

14:57 for the fans everybody everybody wins really I mean having

15:02 this this crew that we're with they're just capable of doing

15:05 anything and we can throw anything at them and like

15:07 we've played three shows it's been all three completely different

15:10 set lists And like we don't that's new for us too and we're very excited by that

15:17 I mean it speaks to like I don't know the legacy

15:19 at this point you know what I mean that you

15:20 can just kind of switch up the set list

15:22 on the fly and feel like there's so there's importance to that.

15:25 Um you know this new album I'm looking and I'm listening to it

15:28 and the thing I took away from it is now knowing a little

15:31 bit of the context of how it came together but like this idea

15:33 of like perseverance and there's like a sense of defiance on this album right.

15:38 Yeah, I mean I think that that I mean I you know a lot of our career has been um

15:44 you know embracing and supporting the artists that have inspired

15:47 us and very few of them have ever been commercially successful.

15:52 Yeah.

15:52 Uh I mean we do these things we call record hangs which are essentially dance

15:55 parties where we play our 45s which has

15:59 become you know it was just something Dan

16:01 wanted to start doing like in 2022 because it it was getting tedious to be

16:05 on the road for him cuz he doesn't like to go to bars and but it's boring

16:09 to sit on the bus and so we started doing it became like you know

16:12 this thing where he asked me to join him and we start you know we start started

16:16 going really deep into collecting 45s and when

16:21 we throw those things like about 95% of what we play is almost it's just almost

16:26 a celebration of how up the music industry is.

16:29 It's like here are all these great songs that should have been like known.

16:32 They should be in your like musical vocabulary,

16:35 but for we for whatever reason they're not.

16:38 You know, you turn on like a classic rock station and growing up, you know,

16:42 we that would be around like in restaurants I worked down in the kitchen

16:44 and my brother's car and stuff and they were playing like 250 songs tops.

16:49 Yeah.

16:50 from from like two decades of of music, you know,

16:54 and and I mean, uh Dan said the other day, he's like he you know,

16:59 he it every single day essentially we're both hearing songs

17:03 that we've never heard before that are blowing our minds.

17:05 Yeah.

17:05 So I'm like it's just like this and and that's just

17:09 that's just like 60s and 70s.

17:10 Imagine what people are going to do 40

17:13 years from now when they skim through the last,

17:16 you know, streaming era of the music that's never been popularized.

17:20 I don't know.

17:21 I feel like you're honoring those artists with this record.

17:23 And I feel like is that what makes it feel so different?

17:27 You know, there's just a lot of soul in these songs.

17:29 There's a lot of there's a lot there's just a lot of stuff to take away from it.

17:33 And I think that's what this it's easy for us to lean into that material.

17:37 um you know the one of the songs on the record uh

17:40 it's a dream is one a 45 that Dan and I both

17:43 found independently and it's like when he played it for me

17:48 and I I have that I just bought it he's like we're like

17:50 the only probably two idiots that have bought this record in like

17:54 years there's and um yeah I mean I think there's just a lot

17:57 there I mean I I think if we were just covered a seals

17:59 and croft album you might not be talking to us right now

18:04 I don't know I don't know you chop it up in 90 I guess maybe we just AB test it.

18:08 Just AB test it.

18:10 Uh I don't know, man.

18:11 Like I I like speaking as somebody who

18:13 grew up listening to your music uh 14 albums

18:16 in and I mean just You mean put three

18:19 records in the last three years, five in the last three and three years.

18:22 Three and three years is crazy.

18:24 Like six and seven years I think.

18:25 It's it's crazy.

18:27 I mean I mean looking back at at at the the arc of it all and like you know

18:30 the discoraphy like was there a point where you're

18:32 like this is not what we want to be doing?

18:36 Like was it the the scale of it?

18:38 Was it the speed of it?

18:40 Was there any point where you guys were like,

18:41 "Man, I'll go back and listen to records that I I like for me like

18:45 were difficult to make and now with enough time like one of those was Turn Blue,

18:50 but it's one of my favorite records now

18:52 and and I just relisted to it like I don't know 6 months ago and I was like,

18:57 man, that that actually is

19:00 something." And um you know, so I think that's the way I look at it.

19:04 You know, I spend more time thinking about like what

19:06 it would be like to be in late period monkeys.

19:10 What's that in your in your the theater of your mind?

19:12 What's what's it like being it's an interesting place to be?

19:16 And I think that yeah like head is a cool space to be in

19:20 like a band assembled then trying to

19:23 legitimize in the in the in the past tense a little bit like go back

19:26 I think it's kind of interesting.

19:29 I just you know I'm just saying I'm a complete nerd.

19:31 So I mean I think I think having an obsession is a good thing.

19:35 One of my obsessions is is sports and I'm

19:38 a Cleveland sports fan and uh I've seen our team get like really good almost win

19:44 the World Series but it hasn't happened since 1948.

19:48 Yeah.

19:48 But every year they get out there and they really actually try to and I

19:52 think that that like it it actually has affected my my my brain

19:57 just being obsessed.

19:59 Just that Yeah.

20:02 like it's not about the winning, it's about the trying.

20:05 It's about like thoughtfulness.

20:07 So, it's it's it's a healthy spot to be

20:10 kind of have a sort of underdog situation,

20:13 you know, because you can never maintain the top forever.

20:16 And so, it's like when you when it's like

20:18 it's also healthy to go back and be really

20:20 humbled by looking at people who have made incredible

20:23 music to have that have had really no commercial success,

20:27 which is essentially what our entire record collections are made out of.

20:31 I mean, Dan, looking back at like where you've come from, where you are,

20:35 I mean, is this this is it for you?

20:37 This is the most cohesive and sort of like locked

20:39 in that you guys feel like as a band moving forward.

20:43 Where we are right now is is a beautiful place and like um

20:48 the freedom that we have because of all the hardships that we went through

20:54 um I think is worth it.

20:55 you know, we're able to do whatever we want now.

20:58 And um it feels really good just like I

21:02 think what's most important is just having creative freedom.

21:04 And that's that's what we do.

21:07 That's that's what we have, you know?

21:08 That's why we're able to make so much

21:10 art and music and help so many different bands.

21:13 And that's like what drives us every day.