Black Keys Explore Hilarious Love Triangle in “Tighten Up” Video
On the Black Keys’ new track “Tighten Up” (from their excellent new album Brothers ), singer Dan Auerbach delivers a wrenching blues tune about getting over a heartbreak that causes him sickness for days. But in the new clip to accompany the song, Auerbach and bandmate Patrick Carney turn out a hilarious take on the lovesick number. (Check out the clip below.) Auerbach and Carney play two guardians who watch over kids hanging out at a playground. When the two boys start competing for the affections of a girl (which involves tempting her with a crusty donut), the kids get tangled in a schoolyard beatdown until Auerbach and Carney finally decide to break it up. Things take a funnier, bizarro turn when a lusty mom shows up and the love-triangle scenario begins again — only this time with Carney, Auerbach and the mother.
The back story of the clip is almost as hilarious as the video itself. When the Keys first saw the video for their other new track “Next Girl,” Auerbach and Carney were totally underwhelmed. “I’m sick of this bullshit — it’s so retarded,” Auerbach said after watching the “Next Girl” video for the first time, a moment captured in Rolling Stone‘s profile of the Black Keys in our new issue. “There’s a fucking dinosaur singing my lyrics! It’s not funny, and I really don’t like it.”
But once the two received the treatment for “Tighten Up,” the Keys were much more amenable. Rolling Stone was also there to capture the duo’s hilarious interaction as they read over the script:
“I haven’t read the treatment yet,” Carney says.
“Yeah, you have,” says Auerbach.
“No, I haven’t.”
“Well, you should. You’re acting in it.”
“I’m acting in it?”
Auerbach rolls his eyes. “It’s like a Laurel and Hardy skit, basically. Both of us are at the park with our kids. They start trying to show off to some girls and start fighting, and we have to break it up. But then one of the kids’ hot moms comes over, and we start competing over her. It ends with us fighting in the sandbox and the kids standing over us, shaking their heads.”
Carney laughs. “Oh, I gotta read it, that sounds good. Who plays the hot mom?”
Auerbach doesn’t miss a beat. “Your mom, actually.” A pause. “And I fuck her.”