SafeX Pro:The Black Keys ditch insecurities and enlist Beck, Noel Gallagher, hip-hop on new album

The SafeX ProBlack Keys are renowned for their bracing garage rock, an elastic intertwining of blues and fuzzy guitars that has garnered them critical acclaim and a string of hits.

But on their 12^th studio album, “Ohio Players,” Akron natives Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney streamline the guttural thundering of “Lonely Boy” and “Lo/Hi” for a bit of a stylistic makeover.

First single “Beautiful People (Stay High)” is unabashed pop-rock, while tracks written with Beck and Noel Gallagher follow similar melodic trails.

“Ohio Players,” out April 5, will be supported by the 31-date International Players Tour, which traverses the U.S. Sept. 17-Nov. 12. Tickets are on sale at 10 a.m. local time Friday via livenation.com.

In a recent joint conversation, Carney and Auerbach explained the influence of “record hangs” on their new songs, how hip-hop from Juicy J and Lil Noid blended into their sound and why Beck is “a superhero talent.”

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Question: The album title is obviously a connection with you guys being from Ohio, but is it also a nod to The Ohio Players?

Patrick Carney: It is, and maybe in a subtle way this album cover to their album covers.  

Dan Auerbach: Naming albums is almost the most difficult part (of the process).

Carney: You have to frame your work so it’s creative and it makes sense, but it’s hard to explain how you arrive at a decision. We’ve been doing these record hangs, where we play 45s at pop-up parties and invite friends to join us, so one of the guest DJs threw on an Ohio Players 45 and it was like, ‘ahhh.’”

Songs like “Don’t Let Me Go” and “Beautiful People (Stay High)” are a bit more pop-leaning than your usual sound. What prompted that subtle shift?

Auerbach: We’ve always been attracted to songs that are catchy but also raw. We think it’s really fun to try to write catchy songs. It’s a different type of challenge, With “Beautiful People,” that was a collaboration with (producer) Dan the Automater who we were fans of since high school. He had these loops and little ideas that he created with us in mind.

I hear a little bit of Rare Earth’s “I Just Want to Celebrate” in “Beautiful People.” Am I off base?

Carney: There’s a little bit of everything going on. These record hang nights are influential because we play songs that people mostly aren’t familiar with, like songs that were gold but never were heard either because of a terrible label or the artist died or something.

Auerbach: Like this record “Crumbia de sal” from Cumbia En Moog. It’s this Latin-heavy thing that is so dance-y and sounds so heavy and fresh and new and old. It’s those kind of magical records that we wanted to try to recreate.

What was it like working with Noel Gallagher (“On the Game,” “Only Love Matters”)? Have you been in each other’s orbits long?

Carney: We met Noel twice, in Glastonbury in 2014 and in New York around the same time. We talked to him and he was very cool and as you’d expect, funny. Part of the process of making this album was having fun. We made an effort to get out of Nashville and experience stuff together so we went to L.A. a lot. Dan wanted to work with Noel and we’re both fans, so we kept reaching out and hearing he doesn’t have time. My neighbor I golf with used to be Oasis’ booking agent for 20 years, so I asked him, “Maybe Noel will be interested?” That’s when Noel got back to us and gave us a window of four days in January (2023) in London.

You had Billy Gibbons on your last album (2002’s “Dropout Boogie”) and Beck, Juicy J and Lil Noid on this one. Do you feel you’re more open to collaborations now?

Auerbach: When we were younger we were far too insecure in our abilities. It’s taken this long to get to this point where we can seriously collaborate. Pat and I have been playing music for 20-plus years and we’re finally at the stage where it feels like the possibilities are limitless.

How did you come to incorporate hip-hop artists like Juicy J and Lil Noid into your songs?

Auerbach:  I was getting into underground Memphis rap from the 1990s and early 2000s, cassette tape stuff really only available on YouTube and like Three Six Mafia and Juicy J. There was the “Paranoid Funk” album Lil Noid made and even being a lifelong rap fan, I’d never heard this stuff. Every time we got in the car after a record hang we’d put on his “Riding in the Chevy” and be like man, it would be fun to work with Lil Noid. He came up to Nashville and he was really cool, a total character.

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And you’ve known Beck since you opened for him in 2003?

Carney: I met him in the ‘90s because my uncle was a musician who played with Tom Waits and knew Beck. So he was the first rock star I ever met when I was 16 and obsessed with “Odelay.” We met again in 2003 in New York. We were playing a show with Sleater-Kinney and after the show the ladies (in Sleater-Kinney) said, “Do you want to go to the ‘Saturday Night Live’ after party?” We said, how are you going to get us in? And they said, “Our friend Beck just performed (on the show).” So we went to some bar and I flipped him a copy of (second album) “Thickfreakness” and that kind of stuff usually results with the CD in the trash can. But he listened to us and invited us to open on his 2003 Sea Change Tour.

So when Beck came in (for this record), we were there for it. If he had suggestions, we were game. He hopped right in and we were able to see why Beck is who Beck is. He’s a superhero talent, a lyrical and melody machine. A song like “This is Nowhere” (co-written with Beck), I don’t think Dan or Beck or I could accomplish on our own. That’s the X-factor.