If all you know about Kings of Leon is “Sex on Fire,” “Use Somebody,” or any song from their hit 2009 album, “Only by the Night,” then you don’t really know Kings of Leon.
Now, I’m not trying to be that guy who claims to know more about music, or a particular band, than everyone else. That guy is annoying and only gets invited to parties because he brings beer. Instead, I’m just the guy who has delved deep into Kings of Leon’s catalog, including all four volumes of “B-Sides & Rarities”— so I know a thing or two about this band.
Their follow-up to “Only by the Night” is “Come Around Sundown,” released Oct. 19, and the first single off the album is “Radioactive,” but wait, do I know this band?
“Radioactive” has poprock, radio-friendly written all over it. The music video shows four guys hanging out at a barn on a sunny afternoon, playing soccer with little kids, flying kites, fishing, and riding bicycles. These four gentlemen cannot be the same four that I’ve come to know and love as Kings of Leon — the leather-boot wearing, drunken southerners who get laid, drink whiskey and bourbon, and write gritty, inelegant rock songs.
I wasn’t a big fan of “Only by the Night.” Yes, “Sex on Fire” and “Use Somebody” were great songs the first time I heard them, but then they became not so great after hearing them hundreds of times on the radio. “Notion” and “Revelry” are also great songs that didn’t get as much attention, and “Closer” was probably the masterpiece of the album. But none of those songs compare to the previous genius the band displayed on earlier efforts.
Songs like “McFearless,” “On Call,” “King of the Rodeo,” “California Waiting,” “Knocked Up,” “The Bucket,” “Slow Night, So Long”— these are songs that most people probably don’t know, yet they are what made this band great, before everyone else thought they were great.
The opening track “The End” seems like a continuation of this mainstream renovation the band has undergone, and while I’m not going to accuse them of selling out, I’ll just say that “The End” makes me long for the past. Where is the attitude? Where is the dirt? Where is the grease? Is this Kings of Leon or Matchbox Twenty? Apparently, it is Kings of Leon. They’re just, figuratively, that friend who decided it’s time to grow up, so he shaves his beard, gels his hair, and goes out to get a job in the city as an accountant.
There’s nothing wrong with growing up or maturing. I just hope it’s really a part of their growing process and not just a gimmick to sell more albums in America, where they struggled for so long to find mainstream success. Even though, we eventually want all these rebellious bands to sober up, get clean, and move on with their lives, a part of us envies them. We envy how carefree they are. We envy their hell-or-high-water mentality. We envy how they don’t care about accolades. We live vicariously through them. When they grow up, we’re reminded that so must we. Youth is short-lived. And good times must someday be traded for responsibility.
Some people will like this album, while others will look upon it with sad eyes. They will remember how these young, reckless, and carefree, rocking, southern men once made them feel while driving down the freeway with the windows down, singing “I don’t care what nobody says, we’re gonna have a baby.” They forgot for a moment, that responsibility is waiting at the next exit. To those people I say, let’s just forget “Come Around Sundown,” and continue dreaming our dream.
