Patrick Carney

I've never seen an outie except for on a baby. I've only seen a handful of belly buttons up close.

Whoever played Ralph on the Wonder Years.

That's a good question. I mean, it's shocking the Beatles don't have their own station. I tried to play a whole show of Beatles music, but for some reason Sirius doesn't have the licensing to allow that. I don't listen to any of the stations that are exclusively devoted to one artist, I find them obnoxious.

Thank you. Arctic Monkeys we've known fora long time, they're really cool dudes. One of the most fun tours we've ever been on. They're extremely funny and really good at ping pong. And there's a couple of ideas that have been floating around with Dan and I musically for over a decade that we still haven't been able to correctly use. There's ideas that we've never been able to figure out how to actually make it work into a song. And whenever Dan and I run into a situation like that, we find it easier to start over. So most ideas are fresh, or what we think is fresh.

Oh man. Like a friend, or a boyfriend / girlfriend?

Sorry buddy. Maybe listening to Will.I.Am's version of the ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT theme song will put you in a better mood. Good times are out there.

I've considered this past year taking some lesson from a jazz drummer. But I realized, well I second-guessed it, because I'm comfortable being shitty.

My dad. Played me the Beatles and Led Zeppelin. And my best friend growing up Steve. Who got an electric guitar when we were in sixth grade, and I wanted one because he had one, I thought he was such a cool dude.

Sadly he passed away in 2004.

Hmm. I don't play favorites with Wu-Tang. Every single member that we've met has been awesome.

It's surreal sometimes. It's just surreal.

But my advice is just to go in the basement and play music and as long as you're having fun doing that, that's the most important thing. Dan and I ended up making a lot of decisions that I wouldn't advise other people to do, like dropping out of college. The only reason I was allowed to drop out is because my grandpa has a PhD, and he said it would be ok if I took a year out of school.

Turkey Jello and Bruce Jenner are both nonviolent. Everyone wins!

You're allowed to keep it. I could not think of anything clever to write on my drumsticks, so that's what I put on it.

Thank you! Making Tighten Up was the most fun we'd ever had. But also the video shoot for 10 Am Automatic was really exciting because we were young, and we'd never met any of our heroes before really, comedy heroes, and we had gotten David Cross from Mr. Show to direct it. So we got to hang out with him.

Honestly, my mind is blown by most. What's yours?

If I was 20, and had millions of dollars and no mentoring, I'd be an asshole too.

The biggest obstacle, here's what it is: reaching a point of pure boredom. It took a long time for me to finally search Jello Meat. And once I crossed that threshold, I became an aficionado.

When we were making the first record, we were covering a song by Junior Kimbrough called "Do the Rump." And I couldn't play the drumbeat, so I moved it to my left and for some reason I could play it only cross handed. But it just stuck, so I've left it there. More comfortable playing it there.

Actually, I don't know. I really don't know. I just post the stuff I love.

We made that song in San Diego, summer of 2008, it was the first song that we recorded for the record that became Brothers, and I don't know where the lyrics came from, but I do know that we had just been on tour all summer and were extremely tired.

Oh. Hm. Shit. Kermit the Frog, definitely, for sure.

I don't really know. I mean, like when we played SNL this past week, when I find out people like Charlize Theron listen to our music, I can't actually tell if they are bullshitting me to this day. But the craziest thing that's ever happened to me? Getting into a fight with Justin Bieber, straight up. An internet argument with Justin Bieber.

I use wood-tip 5A's. And I use a brand called Vic Firth.

I don't know but I have really bad eyesight.

Luigi's. Just cuz there's more variety. I'd be dead within 2 years at either choice.

Recording records is our favorite thing to do. But touring and playing in front of an audience is something we've grown to love just as much.

It's a trap.

The most annoying thing that happened at a show was Leicester, England, and a woman jumped onstage who I'm sure had no idea who we were, I'm not sure why she was even at the show, and literally attacked Dan, but in a real aggressive way with her fingernails. Our tour manager grabbed her and took her outside. Also, throwing bottles is fucking obnoxious.

Yes.

He played the drums on this record.

Yeah, I just tell people how I feel and I don't filter out. Which can be a big problem, especially for my Twitter account. But yea, I don't know. If I knew how to fix whatever problems are in the music industry, I would be doing those. Instead I'm playing the drums in the Black Keys.

No.

Das Boot, or Major League.

Cheeseburgers. I don't eat breakfast.

Coffee?

I need to know more about the band.

Maybe we played a show in Oxford, Mississippi, the summer of 2002 and cleared the entire room and got offered a record soundtrack by Fat Possum that night, so it could be that. Or it could be headlining Lollapalooza in 2012, that was surreal.

Dan's the internet denier.

It's his birthday.

Whenever Dan, Brian and I make a record we all have to agree on what goes on the record. And I had some arguments. There's some unsettled business still. The song will be coming out though.

These are the things I like.

I mean, I don't have favorites. They all were fun to make and they're also all fun to not listen to once we make the next record.

Dan and I are really terrible at coming up with video ideas, so we let the directors write the treatment and make the video and that video was directed by Chris Marrs Piliero, so it was all his handiwork.

Yes.

Actually, that video was one of the more fun videos to make. Forgot about it.

I'm better. But I still have a lot to learn. See, drumming's like golfing. And I don't know why, but I just know I suck at both and am trying to get better. My grandfather golfed for 30 years, but never improved, but he always felt like he did, so maybe that's what's drumming's like.

Smurfs cereal was my favorite cereal growing up.

I was just in Germany, and they had Aspic on the menu. My favorite meat jello is lime jello with shrimp, tuna salad on the top, and a crown of pineapple.

So we have no plans to play there cuz we're playing Cleveland in September. But yeah, hopefully we get to play some sort of show in Akron. I'm back there all the time visiting my family, I love it there.

:(

Mint chocolate chip. Everybody in Drummer lives in a different city now, so probably now. And every time we make a record, we make it in a completely different way. Early on we made our records in my basement, and each record sounded different even then because we were constantly getting new equipment cuz my equipment kept breaking. And this record we recorded the same way we've recorded the last few records, just slightly different microphones. You can hear the sound of a really classic room on this record more than any other record we've ever made. Sunset sound, studio 2.

I mean, I don't consider myself a celebrity. But I miss being able to express my thoughts and not have hundreds and thousands of teenagers attack me.

Thank you. We're going to change that when this ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT theme song comes out.

I remember hearing Nirvana for the first time in 1992, and through that, being introduced to Sonic Youth when their record Dirty came out, and I thought they were a new band then, and they'd been around for a decade. So if someone punched me in the face when I was 12 for just discovering Sonic Youth, I might not be in the band the Black Keys today.

2 cheeseburgers with everything and fried zucchini with ranch.

I had a really interesting encounter in a rest area in Northern California in the middle of the night once, I won't go into detail, but it was terrifying.

Okay in 2002 Dan, my brother Michael and I were driving on our first tour from Portland to San Francisco. And we stopped right near Eureka or something, right near the Oregon & California border, so Mike and I could go pee. We walked into the rest area, into the bathroom, and some guy was standing against the wall glaring at us, and another guy was in a stall with his pants around his ankles moaning.

We ran. We ran away.

I think there was something definitely consensual going on. That was implied. But we weren't supposed to be walking in there.

I read comic books, I watched Terminator 2 a lot. And eventually I started playing music.

A Ludwig Black Beauty.

Thank you. And yeah, I guess with carnitas, white rice, black beans, lettuce, salsa, sour cream and cheese. No guac. I get shit for that all the time, I don't dislike it either, but the texture with sour cream...

Actually, a lot of visual artists. There's an art show up right now in NYC by a man named Mark Flood, I highly recommend it. it's called the Insider Art Fair. 548 West 22nd Street, Zach Feuer Gallery.

I think the first CD I ever owned was a Led Zeppellin 2 that my dad got from the library. That was the first CD I ever listened to on repeat, but only for two weeks, I had to take it back.

I have beard envy cuz I can't grow one. So I kind of resent beards. So the shorter the beard, the better.

Eventually, I'm sure.

I've never been bored playing a concert. But mostly because I'm usually just scared, or tired. But yeah, I don't know, I don't know why I don't get bored.

No. Honestly, I wouldn't.

I dunno what could top Seven Nation Army, I actually get a kick out of hearing it at games. I prefer it to "Hang On Sloopy" the state rock n roll song of Ohio.

I mean, I'd rather eat Dan, because that would imply I would get to live. And I know Dan would eat me. Usually when we're on tour in the UK we eat strictly Nando's or Wagamama.

Congratulations. But no. I won't be able to attend.

It actually wasn't a coal burning power plant, although it's confusing because there's a photo of that on the record cover. When we were looking for a place to set up a studio, the only place that we could find where we could make music loud was an old General Tire rubber factory that was really scary. And we set up on the second floor, where the offices were. And the downstairs was a giant open factory, and there was a laboratory next door to our room. And when they tore it down a few years later, it became a giant Superfund site because it was completely toxic, it was really bad. I remember walking up the stairs in that building, and having trouble breathing the next day.

There's an artist that Dan's father and my father were friends with and helped take care of in Akron named Alfred McMoore. He was schizophrenic, and lived in a halfway house, and really liked to draw with crayons and pencil on 5 foot by 50 foot scrolls of paper, and he was constantly calling both of our houses when we were kids, asking our dads to bring him pipe tobacco, diet coke and crayons. And he would always end the message with "Don't be a black key. Don't be a B-flat." it was his way of saying that the Black Keys sounded dissonant, or insulting someone. He was totally nuts, but a really sweet guy. He used to cry constantly. He passed away in 2009, and Dan and I set up a non profit in his name in Akron that helped take care of him in that halfway house. The service that they provide takes people who have mental disabilities and it helps them pay their bills, makes sure they're insured, that the government doesn't provide services for like that.

Oh that's Mr. Brainwash! That's one of my favorite posters. Mr. Brainwash did that for one of the Staples Center shows. I'm glad you like the collaboration with RZA. It's always intimidating making music with one of your heroes. There's tons of people that Dan and I would like to make music with but are afraid to ask.

Smoke. Cigarettes.

Hopefully next year. We'll be doing another European tour in 2015.

I mean, you kind of have to say Hitler, obviously. But I would like to punch Chester A. Arthur in the face just because he has fucked up facial hair. Just for his fucking beard, I want to punch him in the face.

No preference.

When I was a kid, I really liked Aquafresh. I just liked the colors. But do you remember when they made Bubble gum toothpaste when you were a kid? Yeah, I used to eat that, it was fucking delicious, but don't eat it. That goes right along with something that someone just brought up, Norway, and toothpaste, and half the food they eat in Norway comes in tubes.

I just prefer this.

Vegetable. Celery.

I would order french toast.

I really enjoy playing video games. I have 250 Nintendo games. And a couple times a year I will sit down and test my patience, but I usually play Xbox.

I've worked in lots of restaurants. Never a bakery, although I did consider taking Bakery as a vocational educational program in high school, i went to high school in Akron and watched them make donuts for 3 hours. I wasn't that into it when I found out that bakers had to wake up at 5 AM in the morning. Cookies.

Yeah. Totally cool with those.

I do. I have my Turn Blue socks on. Taking a photo now.

FULL DISCLOSURE: I invest in a sock company. I co own this company called Richer Poorer Socks. I love socks so much that I invested in a sock company. Link.

https://twitter.com/reddit_AMA/status/466672622965886976

I don't know, I prefer to watch the entire trilogy in one sitting.

I can neither confirm nor deny. But confirmed.

Yes! California dates coming soon.

I hate playing with brushes. I don't appreciate them.

Yes! My mom works right down the street from that sign, and my dad just retired from working just across the street from that sign at the Akron Beacon Journal. It's really cool that Akron put that sign up, we've played at Lock 3 before, and at the Spider across the street we played some of our earliest shows. But I think it would be more fair if there were 2 more signs for Devo and Krissy Hynde.

Dan and I have always been friends since we were kids. But we didn't hang out that much. But we both liked music. We had that in common. It's something we bonded over. There was never any tension when we played. Our relationship is very brotherly.