Frank

In case you missed it, the first part of my "Midas Touch" series was a review of "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" as an homage to Brad Pitt. Part two will focus on one of many music projects in which Josh Homme has had a hand.

When I saw this band, Eagles of Death Metal, featured in an Ask.com commercial, I thought to myself, "Hmmm, that sounds like some kind of spin off of Queens of the Stone Age. I wonder if there's some kind of link between the two bands."

Sure enough, Josh Homme – founding member of desert rock bands Kyuss and Queens of the Stone Age – co-founded the Eagles of Death Metal and produced the band's first two albums. On the band's most recent album, sophomore studio album Death by Sexy, Homme sang backup vocals, played drums, bass guitar, guitar and even keyboard.

Homme's co-founder is charismatic journalist-turned-rocker Jesse Hughes, who provides the lead vocals on all tracks and lead guitar on most of them. What Homme and Hughes have created with the EODM is hard to classify, but it certainly isn't death metal. On Death by Sexy the EODM blend garage rock with blues in a way that just makes you want to boogie. Even if you listen to the album sitting down, you can't help but tap your feet and nod your head on every track.

The toe-tapping Death by Sexy induces begins with the opening track and only single from the album, "I Want You So Hard (Boy's Bad News)," which lays the foundation for the album – steady rock beats that provoke the need to dance. You'll even notice some "Chh-chh's" coming from the backup vocals that are reminiscent of "I Only Want You" from the band's debut album.

The second track is "I Gotta Feeling (Just Nineteen)," a sultry Stooges cover that will have you grinding on the dance floor along with the song's grinding riffs and Hughes' falsetto vocals. The next track, "Cherry Cola," follows suit, but gets a little redundant at times, although Homme offers a little QOTSA influence on lead guitar. Down the track list, "Don't Speak (I Came to Make a Bang!)" (Did I mention this band likes parentheses?), falls in line with the album's early tracks, but – as the song implies – is one of the hardest hitting tracks in the lineup.

With "I Like to Move in the Night," "Poor Doggie" and "Chase the Devil," the EODM offer contrasting blues interpretations. "I Like to Move in the Night" is more straightforward and builds energy as the song goes. "Poor Doggie" has a rock anthem feel to it. "Chase the Devil" is a fast-paced blues tune where Hughes howls convincingly that he is "gonna chase the devil tonight."

The Eagles of Death Metal do their namesake justice on "Keep Your Head Up" and "Shasta Beast," which epitomize what you might expect from a death metal version of the Eagles.

Death by Sexy isn't all pounding bass drums and guitars, though. "Solid Gold" sounds as if each band member picked up an instrument at random without tuning it and began playing and figured it out as they went, but it works. The next quirky song is an eerie fairy tale, "The Ballad of Queen Bee and Baby Duck," that apparently involves Homme (whose nickname is Baby Duck) making people dance. Homme's QOTSA flavors return on "Eagles Goth" where ghoulish chanting, moaning and groaning are emitted in the background. Death by Sexy ends nowhere near where it began with "Bag O' Miracles," a campfire spiritual-like blues rendition. Nevertheless, don't be surprised to find yourself slapping your knees.

The lyrics on Death by Sexy won't evoke much deep thought. Most involve Hughes seducing you to dance (among other things) throughout the 38:48 of music, but no matter. Considering how some songs seem to end against their will, Death by Sexy is an album that the band obviously had fun working on and it's equally fun to listen to.