Royal Blood, “Back to the Water Below.”

Just because only two people make up a band, it doesn’t mean they sound like all the other two-person bands. Thank God.

We’ll never know how much the two-person novelty of The White Stripes and The Black Keys making big rock music usually made by twice as many people factored into their popularity. More than their fans want to admit, I suspect. Once they got so overplayed, people just took their supposed greatness for granted.

Royal Blood is much closer to real greatness, which shows on its new record, Back to the Water Below. At their best, Jack White – especially live – leaned into Led Zeppelin, which was effective, for the White Stripes. On the new record, Royal Blood is more Britpop, more Bowie, some Badfinger and T. Rex … definitely more Muse.

The record is so good that the usual tediousness of comparing a band to a handful of other bands is applicable here, simply because Royal Blood’s influences are so good.

So now that the novelty has somewhat worn off, we see Royal Blood more layered and with a depth escaping the bands to which it usually gets compared.

Back to the Water Below is fresh, lively, well-thought-out and simply rocks … in a fuzzy way. It’s not easy to cover the rock, dance, tech, alt-pop constituencies very well in one record. Bassist-guitarist-vocalist Mike Kerr sings like a star here, while drummer Ben Thatcher has a serious grasp on the up-and-down dynamics necessary to make a band sound bigger than it is.

Back to the Water Below kicks off with “Mountain at Midnight,” a Britpop-ish rocker combining jagged guitar with serious groove. Thatcher is a great drummer who knows what to play and when to play it.

“Shiner in the Dark” shows the same jagged groove formula, with great tone. It sounds so full, well-produced and well-arranged while refusing to beat effective parts to death. Royal Blood isn’t afraid of dedicating more parts to a song if it needs it.

The mid-tempo “Pull Me Through” doesn’t waste any space, with measured piano and a great vocal line. Royal Blood doesn’t waste any time getting to transitions, which alone really makes the songs move. But Thatcher pumps groove into nearly everything they do, which goes perfectly with that fuzzy guitar. “Pull Me Through” almost takes a turn into Radiohead territory near the end, only Kerr’s voice is bit warm for that.

“The Firing Line” gets Beatles-dreamy, which is a great pace-changer, especially before the big “Tell Me When it’s Too Late,” in which everything follows Thatcher as he carves a path through the semichaotic riff. They simply pound this half to death, and it works.

“Triggers” is probably the best song on the record. It’s a well put together team effort, with a half groove that’s hard not to move to. Kerr and Thatcher consciously play so well together and make so obvious the notion that a great band is much more than just the sum of its parts—which is something this album shares with its predecessors like 2021’s Typhoons, 2017’s How Did We Get So Dark? and 2014’s self-titled debut. Almost everything fits and sets up the dynamics of something else.

“High Water” is nearly as good, with a great riff and punctuating drama. The guitar buzz stays tenaciously attached to the groove, where it belongs.

“There Goes My Cool” shows off more of the band’s epic lineage through the decades of British hooky dream rock, with a great melody and Kerr expertly dancing his instrument around his voice. It comes in waves and it really works.

Back to the Water Below is worth repeated listening (because it gets better the more you listen). It’s also likely destined for plenty of best-of-the-year lists in a few months.

This story initially referred to the song “There Goes My Cool” incorrectly. We regret the error.

Follow music critic Tony Hicks at Twitter.com/TonyBaloney1967.