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Album Details

• Artist: The Dead Weather
• Album: Sea Of Cowards
• Label: Third Man
• Year of Release: 2010
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: tosnob on 2010-05-19

I don't know about you, but I'm getting Jack Whited out. Between the White Stripes, Raconteurs, and The Dead Weather we've hardly had a break from him. On May 11th we get another dose with the release of Sea Of Cowards, the second album from his Dead Weather project.

I quite liked, Horehound, the debut from the group. The music was fresh, with a modern blues-rock feel that we don't really get from White's other projects. Add in sultry vocals from The Kills' Alison Mosshart and we had an album that was fresh and different from White's standard output.

We're not that lucky this time around. With the exception of "Hustle and Cuss", the blues stomp is buried deep beneath layer after layer of fuzz and drone. Tracks like "I'm Mad" and "Jawbreaker" come across as a jumbled, repetitive mess rather than an innovative sound.

Mosshart's vocals, which were one of the highlights of the debut, are further down in the mix. The worst actually happens as Mosshart is forced to take a back seat to self-indulgent, hook-free noisemaking.

While there is some intriguing and engaging guitar work, it's simply not enough to salvage the album from sounding like the rush job it was.

Despite the letdown of Sea Of Cowards we still have the potential of a new Kills record this year to look forward to.

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