The Black Keys Drop In and Celebrate Dropping Out

Rock/Blues duo The Black Keys stopped by Tampa recently for their Dropout Boogie tour, along with openers Early James and Band of Horses. The evening started off in typical Florida fashion, which means enough rain to drown a small town, but it was nothing a rain poncho and a beer couldn’t resolve.

Singer-songwriter Early James opened the wet evening. Signed to Dan Auerbach’s Easy Eye Sound label, the blues guitarist and singer looked like Wavy Gravy (look up old pictures) and sounded like Joe Cocker. Growling through his set, he proved he has the blues chops.

Up next was Band of Horses, who gave the crowd a strong blues sound. While not the jumping around type of band, they provided a solid set of folk-blues rock.

The Black Keys arrived to thunderous applause. The blues-rock duo, made up of guitarist/singer Dan Auerbach and drummer Pat Carney, have made their own brand of blues palatable to a wide audience that probably wouldn’t listen to that music otherwise. Playing a great mix of classic blues and their hits, the crowd couldn’t sit. There was no getting the audience to sing a verse or physical schticks one expects from a large show and they didn’t need it. The crowd got a solid performance from two men experts in their craft. The songs off their new album Dropout Boogie was met with great approval.