Maybe it's their beat garb or slightly precious names (Hotel and VV), but both threaten to come between the Kills and their audience. On 2003's Keep on Your Mean Side, the duo introduced us to a stripped-back electro-blues that owed a fair bit to the White Stripes, PJ Harvey and Patti Smith, but seemed nonetheless authentically sourced from their own artistic wellsprings. Its successor offers further evidence of this fidelity. Songs such as The Good Ones capture VV 's feral croon and Hotel's scuffed guitar at their most compelling; and the fact that the former emerges from someone with hipsters and Jackie O shades should surely be a bonus, rather than the cover we judge the book by.
Domino