ON SALE NOW
The Black Keys with St. Vincent.
8 p.m. Dec. 11. $35-$75. Philips Arena. 1 Philips Drive, Atlanta. 1-800-745-3000, www.livenation.com
The Black Keys — drummer Pat Carney and singer / guitarist Dan Auerbach — have seemingly been everywhere these past few weeks, promoting their new album “Turn Blue.”
They were all over European television and radio, and then came back stateside where they hit many of the New York-based shows that are beamed out everywhere, including the music slot on “Saturday Night Live” and a farewell trip to “Late Night With David Letterman.
“Turn Blue,” the Ohio natives’ eighth studio album, was released earlier this month and debuted at No. 1 on iTunes. Lead single “Fever” has already made some appearances as part of the soundtrack for televised sporting events.
Carney took a few minutes out of his whirlwind schedule to answer a few questions about the album and the upcoming tour.
Q: So are you guys chomping at the bit to get out on the road?
A: At this point I’m ready to go home for a couple of weeks. But yeah, I’m ready to get out on tour and get the shows happening.
Q: Album No. 8, and you’re arena-rock stars. Are you ready for the backlash that comes when a famous band opens up its sound a bit?
A: Right. The backlash, it was that Pitchfork review (5.8 out of 10), but it’s to be expected. I love music more than anything, and of course they’re going to give The Swans, a band I’ve been trying to listen to since I was 14, a better review than our record. And they probably need it, you know what I mean? I’m just glad we got a better review than the Michael Jackson record because Michael Jackson didn’t even make it (chuckles).
Q: “It’s Up To You Now” and “Gotta Get Away” were the first songs recorded for this album and those were just you and Dan, right?
A: It was those two plus “Fever,” and then we did like 12 songs in Michigan, and then went to L.A. with Danger Mouse … We had a lot of (stuff) to go through. But the record ended up being mostly the L.A. sessions.
Q: At what point did you guys decide to say “screw expectations, screw a single, we’re going to do what we want?”
A: We went to Michigan to knock everything out that was on the top of our heads, just every idea that came we put it down. Then we took some time off, and then we went to L.A. and started recording, and everything we did we felt really good about. But we knew it wasn’t a single, necessarily, and we never went into that mode where we were trying to write a single. We just kept writing (stuff) we thought was cool.
Q: I’m guessing that once you guys hit the road, the smoothness of these new songs will be taking on a rougher rock edge?
A: By the time we come around to Cleveland (Sept. 6), we’ll be able to play the whole record. … We want to do a way more diverse selection of songs from all the records. We have a tendency to settle into a setlist and play the same 25 songs over the course of a tour, and I think this time we want to be picking from about 40 songs.
