The Black Keys announced their 12th full-length ‘Ohio Players’

The Black Keys kicked off the new year with the release of their new single ‘Beautiful People (Stay High)’, now available on all streaming platforms. The track comes with the announcement of their 12th full-length studio album ‘Ohio Players‘ that is set to be released on April 5 via Nonesuch/Warner Records.

The festive ‘Beautiful People (Stay High)’ was written by The Black Keys‘ Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney, with the help from old friends Dan ‘The Automator’ Nakamura and Beck, and is one of the many songs on the album that were made in collaboration with a variety of friends and colleagues, like Noel Gallagher and Greg Kurstin.

About the collaborations, Carney says:

“We had this epiphany: We can call our friends to help us make music! It’s funny because we both write songs with other people – Dan all the time [as a solo artist and producer], me when I’m producing a record. That’s what we do.”

Auerbach adds:

“No matter who we work with, it never feels like we’re sacrificing who we are. It only feels like it adds some special flavor. We just expanded that palette with people we wanted to work with. We were there to support them and their ideas, to do whatever we could to see that moment flourish. But when it came time to finish the album, it was just Pat and me.”

“We’d never worked harder to make a record. It’s never taken us this long to make an album. We took our time and did it right.”

During the making of ‘Ohio Players’, a title inspired by the legendary funk band from Ohio of the same name, The Black Keys also did DJ sets at dance parties in cities all over the world where they spinned 45s from their own eclectic and expanding collections. The loose atmosphere of those parties has permeated the DNA of the album, since they had so much fun with it.

Earlier last week, the American music and movie festival SXSW announced the world premiere of the new docu ‘This is a Film About The Black Keys’. The movie follows the remarkable journey of Dan and Patrick, two neighborhood kids who started out jamming in a basement in Ohio all the way to becoming rock ‘n’ roll superstars.