Brothers by The Black Keys

Brothers, the Black Keys' sixth album, dropped on Nonesuch on May 18, 2010, and it almost didn't happen. Dan Auerbach's solo record, Keep It Hid, had left Patrick Carney fuming, and the duo had to patch things up before they could get back to work. When they did, they headed to the slightly run-down Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Sheffield, Alabama, late in 2009, and the rough-edged room pushed them toward stripped-back songs and a deep, heavy bottom end. More sessions followed at Mark Neill's Soil of the South studio in La Mesa, California, their own home studio in Akron, Ohio, and the Bunker on Apple in Portland, Oregon. The band produced most of it with Neill; Danger Mouse took the controls for "Tighten Up".

The sound is swampy, sweaty garage blues with a soul singer's heart. "Tighten Up" struts on a fat, bouncy groove, "Howlin' for You" stomps along on a primal, glam-rock beat, "Everlasting Light" slinks and shimmers, and "Next Girl" and "Sinister Kid" grind and swagger. Carney's brother Michael designed the deliberately plain sleeve.

"Tighten Up" gave them their first Hot 100 appearance and spent 10 weeks at the top of the Alternative Songs chart, and the album reached number 3 on the Billboard 200, their best showing yet. At the Grammys in 2011 it won Best Alternative Music Album, "Tighten Up" took Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, and Michael Carney won for Best Recording Package. It sits between Blakroc and El Camino in their catalog.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.