Dan Auerbach Brings Honky Tonk Rock to ACL

© Steve Hopson / RumBum.com

Dan Auerbach brings it big time.

Stalwart fans endured a test of will by sticking around for Dan Auerbach's set at 7:15pm on Sunday night.  Muddy and gross, the ACL's Austin Ventures stage was not a welcome nest for his eager listeners, but Auerbach (commonly known as "one half of The Black Keys) made it all worth it. Playing off his new first solo album, Keep It Hid, Auerbach decided to do exactly the opposite, and blew open the door of his bluegrassy garage rock soul for all to enter.

With backing by the San Antonio-based band, Hacienda, Auerbach puts out a significantly greater giddy-up rock sound as a solo act than with The Black Keys. The band may be musicians, but they paint the picture of urban cowboys, too. Onstage, Abraham on keys was clad in a red flannel button down tucked in tight, snug Levi's, and a killer oversized gold oval belt buckle; Dante on the lead guitar sported a sweet brown leather vest, dark shades and a bandana that hung in a triangle below his hefty brown beard. All he was needed was the sheriff's badge.

In any case, the guys created the perfect illustration for "Streetwalkin' ", a narration of a man chasing pavement under cloudy skies of loneliness, discontent, and personal failures to a musical blend of honky tonk and rock with a hint of Chippewa. The three rocking, rolling, and wailing guitars (one by Auerbach) left the fans in pieces, as did the cymbal clashing maracas and pulsing drums. By the way, with the kind of beats Auerbach tosses around, don't expect just one drum set. Hacienda throws down on two drum sets, a duo of tall bongos, and a triangle (for extra awesomeness).

The sextet also avoided convention by bypassing regular drumsticks for the ones with the white rubber balls at the end - the ones that make a distinct "bwong" – for Auerbach's hit "I Want Some More."  Everyone wanted more of that bluesy-rock-meets-Arabian-Nights piece whose primal percussion and pounding bass seemed to set the stage for a camel-riding cowboy clopping through a scrap metal desert during a lightning storm.