“Consolers” Has Some Hits & Misses

The Raconteurs debut album, “Broken Boy Soldiers”, was one of the best albums of 2006. Their second album, “Consolers Of The Lonely”, is nothing like their first. Much like the first single from the album, “Salute Your Solution”, it is very herky-jerky with lots of starts and stops.

First of all, The Raconteurs amps must go up to 11 for sure because the power chords on the majority of the album are cranked. This is as loud or louder than any guitars you heard on “Soldiers” or any White Stripes album. For me, it’s a little distracting sometimes. The song “Hold Up” is immediately skipped every time I get to it. I just can’t handle the obnoxious power chords on it, “Five On The Five” or the title track. It’s odd but when Jack White breaks out the heavy guitar, it turns me right off on this album.

My favorite tracks on this album are the quieter ones. My favorite song on the album is the last track “Carolina Drama”. It’s got that Americana sound complete with fiddle and a vivid story painted by Jack’s lyrics. “Old Enough” also has an Americana feel with that same fiddle and organ. I also like the two songs (“You Don’t Understand Me” & “Many Shades Of Black”) that really give the other guitarist/vocalist Brendan Benson some time to shine.

Overall, as painful as it is to say, this is really a Jack White guitar album. He really dominates here when he sounded more like a band member on “Broken Boy Soldiers”. My expectations for this album may have been too high that I am inevitably disappointed but it just feels like something is missing. At 14 songs, it may actually be too lengthy and if they trimmed out three or four songs, you would have a much smoother sounding album.