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Jack White with Brendan Benson and two members of the Greenhornes does not constitute a supergroup, which is sort of how the Raconteurs have been labeled. The expectations have been high, and with the release of Broken Boy Soldiers, the band has far exceeded them. With a full band (and a more capable drummer) fleshing things out, White isn’t forced to single-handedly hold his audience’s attention, and with a little more room for experimentation, the songs are actually much more developed than a lot of the members’ past work. Broken Boy Soldiers has the requisite Beatles harmonies of ‘Call It A Day’ and ‘Together’, the straightforward hard-rocking skronk of ‘Steady As She Goes’ and the unexpectedly prog syncopations of ‘Store Bought Bones’. Projects like this can be a waste of everyone’s time, but once in awhile it seems that the stars have aligned, and maybe, just maybe, these dudes were meant to be in a band together all along.
