No sign is more indicative of a band’s soaring stardom…
No sign is more indicative of a band’s soaring stardom than the acrimonious debates fought out between their earliest fans. That Kings Of Leon’s fourth album, Only By The Night , sold over six million copies worldwide – and was Australia’s highest selling album in 2008 – proved too much for some of their old-school fans. Separation papers were posted while the Tennessee four-piece continued to reach listeners with an anthemic album that, for some, proved too divergent from the ragged and bluesy southern rock of their first two albums, Youth And Young Manhood (2003) and Aha Shake Heartbreak (2004). Needless to say, pleasing everybody is an impossible feat. Writing a record is a gargantuan task in itself… attempting to understand the sensitivities of one’s various listeners – whether chin-stroking thinkers, hit followers, brow-wrinkled cynics or social hipsters – is quite another. With their fifth album Come Around Sundown , Kings Of Leon have kept one eye on their own artistic trajectory and the other on their increasingly expansive fan-base.
The success of Only By The Night appointed Kings Of Leon as one of the world’s biggest bands. Success and acclaim had always awaited them, but no one had anticipated that a hairy southern rock band from Tennessee would become embraced by the mainstream with such furore. Matthew and Jared Followill were still teenagers when that debut album, Youth And Young Manhood, was praised by Village Voice as “2003’s finest rock debut”.
Its follow-up, Aha Shake Heartbreak, furthered the band’s growing status as indie princes (and even featured in Rolling Stone’s Top 100 Albums of the Decade). The band’s third album, Because Of The Times (2007), surprised old-school fans with its more polished and epic nature as highlighted by hits such as On Call and Fans… but it wasOnly By The Night that summoned stadium tours by unleashing the group’s most accessible rock ’n’ roll anthems to date in Sex On Fire and Use Somebody.
Although the band seem to be revelling in their wide-spread success – headlining the world’s biggest festivals and their own sold-out shows – moments of sheer confusion and doubt have also arisen; the most infamous being Caleb Followill’s own vicious criticism of their biggest hit, Sex On Fire, which he has since apologised for. The frontman had previously decried that he was “embarrassed to look out from the stage every night and see people who weren’t like me”, explaining afterwards that he was frightened, at times, by the intensity of their fame.
It seems that few are more confused by it all than the band themselves. “At some point, for a while, we were just everyone’s secret or something,” says lead guitarist Matthew Followill – cousin to the three Followill brothers. “Everyone was just like ‘oh, I like Kings Of Leon’ and then they’d tell their friends and they’d be like ‘oh, I’ve never heard of them’.
“And I’ve felt the same way before – you have this band that no one else knows about that you like so much and you think is so good. When Only By The Night came out and we got popular, I think the older fans were just like ‘oh, I don’t like them anymore; I want to like someone new’. Then, you get so many other fans, so I don’t know….”
Drummer Nathan Followill recently stated that KOL were barely scratching the surface of their musical and song-writing abilities. Irrespective of the listener’s expectations, how much pressure does the band apply on their own musical ambitions? “It’s really hard to tell what the fans are gonna like, because you’ll think the fans will like one thing and they end up not liking it at all,” laughs Matthew, “and then they’ll like something you thought they wouldn’t like very much.
“I think we learned that after making a couple of albums and we started saying: ‘we just have to make music that makes us happy and music that we want to listen to and enjoy’. And then hopefully the fans will like whatever we do.
“So there’s definitely pressure… I mean, you can only hear so many times that ‘your first two records were your best and then you got shit after that’. So it’s like ‘okay, so if everyone loves our first two records so much…’ then it just kinda gets into your brain… and then you make songs like Back Down South and Pony Up (two of the roots-y/country and blues-influenced tracks on the new album). It just happens that way because you think ‘maybe we were better then? And our fans will like it’.”
For a band who summon almost a religious fervour and loyalty from their fans, do the Kings Of Leon still find solace in religion (having grown up travelling with their preacher father) or has music become the core of their spirituality? “I think all of us say our prayers at night before we go to bed, but it’s not like we go to church every Sunday or anything,” Matthew denotes.
“I think we all still believe or whatever, but I don’t think it plays a big role in our music or anything like that. It’s basically just the way we grew up.”
Come Around Sundown is more eclectic than KOL’s last two albums – and slightly more experimental without discarding their pop sensibilities – while also recalling some of the long-missed elements that defined their first two records. The new album is, therefore, a diverse record that’s likely to unsettle some and delight others.
“I think that with the success of Only By The Night, we just strived to not let it change us, really,” Matthew affirms. “We could have gone in and written 14 pop songs or whatever, but I think we just wanted to go in and not let the success go to our heads; we wanted to go in and make the best record that we could make. I’m pretty proud of it… I think we did a good job.”
The band focused more intently on capturing a rawness and vulnerability, and refrained from over-thinking or perfecting elements. “We had six months off and then we all got together and went into a rehearsal space,” relates the guitarist. “We all brought ideas to the table and just started writing the songs…
“It’s really exciting when things come together, you know, when Caleb will play something and then I’ll add something to that and everyone really likes it. It makes us really excited to get into the studio when a song’s already good in the rehearsal space.” The album was recorded at New York’s Avatar Studios and produced by their long-standing studio partners, Angelo Petraglia and Jacquire King.
Radioactive – the first single from Come Around Sundown – took on an exciting transformation before reaching its current form. “It was tougher than the other songs – that song was actually the last song that we finished and it was one of the first ones that we started on,” Matthew informs. “It’s definitely fun to bring back old songs.”
With its tantalising hooks and simple chorus cry, Radioactive is one of the most infectious and accessible songs on the album, but it’s in no way indicative of the record’s varied sounds. The only songs matching the catchiness of Radioactive is The Immortals (in which Caleb sings poignantly: “Find out what you are face to face / Don’t forget to love ’fore you’re gone”) and the glistening pop majesty of Pyro.
The opening song on the album – ironically titled The End – is set be one of their most challenging songs to interpret live. “We haven’t played it live yet, but I know it’s going to be really tough,” Matthew chuckles. “Actually in three days, we’re going to New York to rehearse all the new songs to get them perfect. It’s really tough because it has three guitar parts in the song and there’s only two guitar players… so we’ll have to do weird and different things. It’s definitely gonna be a challenge.”
But as the amiable guitarist pertained to earlier, it was the band’s adamant incorporation of their core influences and roots-y ideals that would prove particularly significant on Kings Of Leon’s fifth album. Back Down South is a moving depiction of the band returning to their roots, and serves as a testament to KOL’s rustic blues influences. “It was great – that song started with a lap steel guitar that I bought in Los Angeles and I played that line over and over,” Matthew enthuses.
“I just thought it’d be really cool, ’cause it sounded kinda country and like our earlier stuff… like a Built To Spill-type song or something. I ended up getting together with the boys and showing them the guitar line and it just gave us a great feeling – we just thought ‘you know, we’re in New York City and kinda missing home’ and it just happened that way. It’s good to go back to the roots-y feeling of the first record.”
KINGS OF LEON’s new album Come Around Sundown is out now through Sony.
