Life is good for Kings of Leon
Agannis Arena, Boston, April 20, 2009
Reviewed by Jeffrey B. Remz
Life has been real good for the Kings of Leon. Their fourth disc, "Only By the Night," was out last fall to positive reviews. They now have a hit to their credit with Sex on Fire, and the family quartet (three brothers and their cousin) are filling the arenas ranging from Madison Square Garden in late January to two nights at this venue at Boston University.
The Kings of Leon are high on making the music matter and very low on shtick and stage presence. Musically, in a set apparently very slightly changed from the opening night stand, KOL played songs from across their four releases.
The group seems to alternate between two musical styles. They can rock, while almost always putting lead singer Caleb Followill's voice way above the mix. They also would sometimes tone it town, opting for a more pop-flavored, mid-tempo, sometimes ballad-like sound with Followill's delivery even more important. Use Somebody, offered near the end of the regular set, found the crowd singing along on the pop-flavored song. Here, they mixed it up a bit with backing vocals.
Followill delivers quite well. Being from Kentucky, he has bit of a drawl to his delivery with a soulful bent often informing the songs. One gets the sense that he really has thought about the lyrics because he puts a lot of himself into the singing. Crawl found the band on fire with full vocals from Caleb plus a tremendous degree of musically intensity and lots of very good, steely guitar licks from Matthew Followill on a very sturdy delivery. Caleb also showed his vocal prowess on the more commercial sounding California Lady. Only towards the end did he let himself even smile (something he should have done more of, given that the evening was going well).
Guitarist and cousin Matthew had a lot of steel-based, sharp guitar runs throughout the night with Caleb taking a few himself. Matthew's sound at times recalls Edge of U2. The rhythm section of drummer Matthew and bassist Jared respectively also kept the music moving.
The band could use a tad more musical diversity. Yes, they could slow it down and sound quite good, but a few more backing vocals or variety would have serve them even better.
This young band isn't filled with a tremendous sense of stage charisma. Caleb talked with the crowd every so often, but didn't provide any particular insight into himself or the band. And that meant that the music borethe brunt of the performance. Perhaps that's the way they wanted it in concert, and the Kings of Leon showed themselves up to the task. No wonder life is good.
The Walkmen, a band that developed in the wake of Jonathan Fireater, offered a 40-minute rock set. They were at times slightly rootsy and mixed it up enough to maintain interest. Not a small feat, given the small size of the crowd there to see them as well.
Lead singer Hamilton Leithauser also proved to be the focal point of the band. The tall, rangy singer was confident in his delivery, and his backing mates were up to the task as well at least for the half of the set able to be seen.
