Nashville, TN · rock

Kings of Leon

1 upcoming festival

Tennessee arena-rock dynasty — 'Sex on Fire' still combusts on cue, with a garage-era back catalog for the faithful.

Kings of Leon formed in Nashville in 1999 around the Followill brothers — Caleb, Nathan and Jared — with cousin Matthew Followill on lead guitar. The sons of a travelling Pentecostal preacher, they arrived with a scrappy, Southern-inflected garage rock sound and a heavy debt to classic rock, finding early success in the UK before the United States caught up.

Over subsequent albums the band widened its scope considerably, trading the yelped vocals and lean arrangements of the early records for a bigger, more echoing arena sound. That shift produced 'Sex on Fire' and 'Use Somebody', the songs that made them a stadium act worldwide. Caleb Followill's raw, slurred delivery remains the group's most recognisable feature, and live sets tend to move between the anthems and the rougher early material.

rock