Kings of
Kings Of Leon/Helio Sequence
Avalon,
by Marc Hirsh
originally published in The Boston Globe, August 8, 2005
The Kings Of Leon may be the sons (and one nephew) of a Pentecostal preacher and hail from below the Mason-Dixon line, but if there was ever anything that made them a Southern Rock band as the term is typically understood (and as they are often labeled), you wouldn’t have known it from their performance at Avalon on Friday. Instead of relying on the blues and country accents that characterize that genre, the quartet seemingly located an entire sonic world ripe for the plucking in Ram Jam’s “Black Betty,” with a few Jet-style raveups and some touches of the Strokes and Guided By Voices for good measure.
The band’s two albums should have made that clear, but onstage The Kings Of Leon provided a different experience entirely, more direct and nervy than on record. If their songs can be somewhat repetitive and their lyrics occasionally awkward, none of that particularly mattered as they blazed through numbers like “Velvet Snow,” “King Of The Rodeo” and “Wasted Time.”
In any other band, singer and nominal frontman Caleb Followill would have been the focus, resembling a long-haired Ashton Kutcher and yowling in a voice that crossed Chris Robinson with Bon Scott. But those who were paying attention couldn’t help but notice that the real action seemed to be happening off to the side, where guitarist and cousin Matthew Followill tore off one fiery lead after another.
He made it seem as though the songs, whether speedy numbers like “Pistol Of Fire” and the psychobilly “Spiral Staircase” or slower ballads like “Trani,” were merely excuses for him to attack the fretboard. By the time they closed with the urgent “Slow Night, So Long,” the rest of the Kings Of Leon had fully caught up to him, bristling with such electric abandon that there wasn’t any room for Matthew to solo, and there wasn’t any need.
The two men of the opening Helio Sequence made like a harder Postal Service, using only the minimal tools of guitar, drums and a sequencer to pull variously from aspects of ’60s pop, ’70s prog and ’80s postpunk technophilia.