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...is that previous generations of blues-inspired indie-rock bands (think Pussy Galore/Jon spencer Blues explosion, Honeymoon Killers, the Gun Club, Mule, Gibson bros, Red Red Meat, Delta 72, Royal Trux in their mighty 92-93 era etc.) were still very much playing indie-rock/noise/Post-hardcore/punk/whatever with the *tonal language*/riffs etc. of blues-rock/classic rock/garage etc.
White Stripes and Black Keys on the other hand sound as if they are playing in an "authentic" old-fart classic rock style BUT in the *forms* of alternative rock (=stripped down arrangements, structures etc.) whereas their influences were jamming and grooving and having great basslines and drum-patterns etc. It's like form over content (=basslines, riffs, melodies etc.-obviously, a riff like "Seven nation army" is already classic but how many other riffs like that did Jack have? And Black Keys riffs are so tired and generic that I can only quote my buddy Jocke in Graveyard:STANDARD riffs) to me because the content is straight and generic; it's the form that makes it new but the form doesn't make it better, quite the opposite.
The bands of the past playing blues-rock were not playing this lazy shit, they were playing their asses off and previous blues-inspired indie-bands were still sounding punky or noisy and impossible to compare with their precedents. Black Keys has not managed to transcend their influences at all, they just offer an "alternative-rock"-friendly version of that sound; as someone who actually LOVE blues-based rock from the past, it just sounds weak in comparison and I suspect that a lot of the love those bands got was simply based on how much people missed DA BLOOZE in the context of modern, lily-white and anemic indie-rock, alternatively that modern day rock auidences are scared of good musicianship and want everything to be as stripped down as possible, after all, being good at your instrument is "cheesy"...
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