I remember a time when the Kings of Leon were just another band, competing for market share with the most popular bands of the day. They had to compete for college radio airplay and placement on "hip" shows such as Entourage, just like everyone else. That era was 2003, and the other bands of the day were the Strokes, the White Stripes, the Hives, and you could probably imagine the others. But nowadays, the Kings of Leon no longer have to play those games. Because now, the Kings are NOT just another band. They are THE band, the rock n roll saviors, situated on Itunes playlists in between Lady Gaga and Kid Rock. They are performing at ridiculously expensive awards shows. Selling out arenas. And people love them, really, really badly. How bad? Z-100 bad. "13 year old girls will give ANYTHING to go to their show" bad. And how do I feel about all of this? I feel like I've just been punched in the fucking gut. Really, really hard.
I used to like Kings of Leon way, way back in the day, when they were the only Skynyrd and Southern blues-influenced band on my college radio station. I even bought a Kings of Leon T-shirt, went to a Kings of Leon concert, because in college it was the "cool thing" to do. Back then it was cool, because no one knew who the fuck they were. Arrogant siblings who squabbled backstage, sang and played like they didn't give a fuck what anyone thought, and rocked out consistently and thoroughly without a radio hit that anyone knew. This WAS a cool band. Or so I thought. (By the way, "Pistol of Fire" is a kickass song. I will give them that. Not in their live repoirtoire anymore. Fuck that)
These were the days when people HATED them. The press hated them, Americans hated them, and other bands thought they were douchebags. And that's exactly why I liked them. But that was just for a few months. Then, their music did start getting featured on shows such as the the aforementioned "Entourage" and movies like "Cloverfield" And they started to gain a reputation as "that party band": swilling booze on the Lower East Side, fucking supermodel chicks, appearing in tabloids, having celebrities hanging out backstage at their shows. That's where their slow decent into shit started.
Then last year, they released their second album in two years, "Only If By Night". Same thing they pulled back in 05' with "Aha Shake Heartbreak": release the same record two years in a row and market it as being "a huge step forward" or "sonically expanding" or whatever bullshit excuse bands give their fans to buy the same product.
But the problem was, the American people didn't treat this Kings of Leon record like they did the one before. Because apparently, on this one you could actually understand what the fuck their singer was saying. And it had singles. Huge singles. So last summer, they released their first single, "Sex On Fire", and it became a hit. The chorus: "Yeeeahahhhhhh! This sex is on fire!" Definitely a chorus the beer-swilling idiots of America can rally around. And definitely added to their "party-band" image.
Stupid chorus, stupid song. And THAT's how they became popular. Dumb their shit down for Nascar Joe to sing along to.
This single became way too big too fast. And the follow up "Use Somebody" is now being hailed as the "power ballad" of the new millenium. Every teenager in the country knows the words. That's great. Just fucking great. I have always hated power ballads. And now, to have girls claiming that they were "fans from the beginning" when really they're bandwagon groupie fuckers, the band is really in a bad place.
Then they played Madison Square Garden. Usually when a band plays MSG, it's just another stop on their tour and that's it. But the Kings of Leon would not shut the FUCK up for months about how they played MSG. They even released a live album called "Kings Of Leon: Live At MSG". WHO FUCKING CARES? Now, stupid girls will not shut the fuck up about them. They and the Killers have somehow enraptured even the stupidest and blandest members of "Idiot America". There's girls who don't know what a Stock is, what a Bailout is, yet know every word of "Only If By Night".
I HATE Kings of Leon now. Fame destroyed this band. People now are claiming them as the "saviors of rock n roll", when really each record, each single they make gets worse and worse. How can one family produce a bunch of degenerate, douchebag, sellout fuckers. I truly with they had been a bunch of girls who never picked up a guitar. Or had just never been born. As of right now, I'd take either one.
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