Song, by Toad

I was very pleasantly surprised by the last Kings of Leon album, when they seemed to find some genuine bite, which gave their music a welcome boost in my estimation. Their first couple of albums were very enjoyable, although given how similar Aha Shake Heartbreak was to Youth & Young Manhood, I was very much ready to hear something different and I think Because of the Times delivered it.

This record continues in a similar vein to its direct predecessor, with a bit more snarl to the opening tracks, but seems to lose its way a little after that. Use Somebody is pretty rotten, sounding more like dismal classic rock than anything at all edgy or interesting.

The rest of the album continues to dance this coy little dance with us, with Revelry and 17 (do not listen to the words if you want to enjoy this one, they’re more than a little creepy) both good, but there are a few too many aimless drifts into some sort of soft/classic/borderline glam rock netherworld for me to really enjoy the album as a whole.

It’s the dubious territory inhabited by the bad songs which seems to overtake the enjoyment of the good ones, and somehow I find myself really not liking this record, despite liking quite a few songs off it. If they’d erred on the site of vitriol and energy I might have been less put off.

Kings of Leon – Closer
Kings of Leon – Revelry

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It’s been an utterly dismal year for highly anticipated records by the big groups in 2007, but fortunately the slack has been taken up by loads of smaller acts bringing new things to the table. Except for one thing.

A really big, angry pair of rock ‘n’ roll bollocks.

I got accused, when talking about gratingly affected furry-minged feminist hippy intellectuals as part of my St. Vincent review, of being part of the ‘testosterone-fuelled indie rock blogosphere’. The cheek! But Wendy was right – I have been reviewing sensitive, introspective, subtle and slightly eccentric albums for a depressingly long time now. Not that I don’t like the music, but what my inner Neanderthal is crying out for at the moment is some raging, furious, guitar-battering indie howl. Take the shackles off lads, get your balls out and beat the shit out of your guitars. I mean, seriously, what the fuck am I supposed to listen to when I’m three-quarters of the way through a bottle of gin, it’s three in the morning and I want to play something fucking loud?

So far this year, although there has been the odd really good ‘turn it up fucking loud’ song, it’s always in total isolation, and very few and far between to begin with. Nothing with the snarl of the Von Bondies’ first album, for example. Or the Libs’ first. Or half of The Wedding Present’s early material. Or Yo La Tengo at their most incoherent. Or early Nick Cave when he went all apocalyptic on us. Even Grandaddy have a couple. Grandaddy!

It doesn’t have to be completely mental and just making a lot of noise isn’t enough. ‘Rawk’ is dreadful and need not apply. It has to have an insistent beat, be drenched in pain, and have some real fucking menace to it. Then, at some point it has to get properly fucking loud, with guitars that drive you into spasms of lurching, drunken air guitar, face clenched like a Baptist’s buttocks at Pet Shop Boys concert.

This year’s best examples:

Parts & Labour – Fractured Skies That frenetic beat, when it gets going, is enough by itself, but when the guitar kicks in..
The Twilight Sad – And She Would Darken the Memory It may take its time to get going, but it’s well worth the fucking wait.
Kings of Leon – Charmer Not especially loud, this one, but that insistent beat and the pained screech still do it for me.
The Arcade Fire – Intervention This is a big, angry song – brilliant!
Grinderman – No Pussy Blues If you nee d this exp laining to you, then you will never understand anyway.

Some classics from yesteryear:

The Von Bondies – No Regrets
The Strokes – Juicebox Just listen to that beat – fucking marvellous – and there’s a distinctly prog-tastic guitar solo in the middle as well. Fucking great
The Wedding Present – Blonde The definitive song of wounded indie rage?

When they first emerged Kings of Leon were described as ‘The Southern Strokes’. I never thought twice about it at the time, but the two bands have followed oddly similar career trajectories. Both released initial albums that were good, but not much better than that and second albums that were largely disappointing. Generally I preferred the Kings’ output considerably in the earlier years, although I was by no means what you’d call a really committed fan.

Then, last year, The Strokes released an absolutely scorching third album completely out of the blue that absolutely knocked spots off anything they had done before. Accordingly, The Kings of Leon have now followed them with their own third album that, although by no means as good, represents a similarly major step forward for a one-time buzz band struggling to extricate themselves from the musical cul-de-sac in which they had found themselves trapped.

It’s by no means ground-breaking, this one, and all the trademark Southern rock sounds are entirely present and accounted for as you might expect. The difference, again mirroring that of The Strokes, is the ragged, venomous edge that has appeared from nowhere to suddenly give the music real bite. Because of the Times is a little inconsistent, and nothing like as good as First Impressions of Earth, but there are quite a few tracks with real tension and snarl to them that comfortably eclipse anything the Kings of Leon have done before. I very, very pleasantly surprised. It’s not exactly a masterpiece, but it’s a real album, this.

Kings of Leon – Charmer
Kings of Leon – McFearless

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Don’t expect those songs to stay up for long. The RIAA were waving their dicks about like junior toyshop truncheons when the pre-release tracks for this album leaked, so they aren’t at all unlikely to jump all over this with all the giddy enthusiasm of an ageing bitch drunk with the joys of Spring.

They’re so piteous, the RIAA. They’ve absolutely no idea what they’re supposed to be doing, nor the first, tiniest little clue how to go about doing it so they just stumble blindly around the internets, randomly swinging their stick at anything they can see, without the faintest twinkling of an inkling as to what they’re trying to achieve. A bit like a big strong boy with learning disabilities who just breaks a teapot because it confuses him and that makes him cross, despite not having any real idea what he’s cross about.