I legitimately think The Black Keys are one of my favorite groups of all time.

Excited for El Camino!

The black keys are not indie. Their first albums were very bluesy. And whoever said they don't like dans voice, wow. His voice is so soulful and great. After reading the indie education thread, I guess they can be considered indie. But they're still a band that started on blues rock and has released a dedication album to the blues great junior kimbrough. At what point do all these music labels and sub genres become a bit excessive? There's so damn many labels on music. Maybe people are trying to hard to label music.

I like genre labels because it gives me an idea of what I'm going to be listening to. Although The Black Keys probably aren't "indie", this forum is called "indie and alternative" and they most certainly fit the "alternative" mold...

But they also fit the blues and blues rock mold. They make blues-rock music, not alternative music. And if Brothers is the only album you know, you need to dig a little deeper into their music. I think a lot of kids who listen to The Black Keys ever since their popularity exploded dont even realize that their listening to the blues, or musicians who were heavily inspired by the blues.

Ya man, read through the thread, I've got everything they've released and Thickfreakness is my favorite. And I get that they play blues inspired rock music... so which forum would you put them in? Can't put them in the blues forum because they have too many rock elements. "Rock and metal"? Meh, I think they're right where they should be--an alternative rock band inspired by the blues...

The best place for them would be a blues-rock thread. What makes them alternative? The fact that they were making blues based music in a time when blues wasn't popular?

I pine for the days when "indie" was short for independent, and didn't mean scrawny guys playing jangly guitar driven pop/rock that would eventually wind up on an ad for iTunes.

For being so irritated with the way people try too hard to label music, you sure are trying hard to label the music. Let's just agree to classify them as "****ing awesome", and enjoy the tunes.

You're right. Im just tryin to make it clear as to what kind of music they make.

Yeah dude, and when alternative radio stations actually played alternative music. How much longer until the next new term arises?