Nashville, TN · rock

Kings of Leon

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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 Mount Juliet, Tennessee, in 1999, built around brothers Caleb, Nathan and Jared Followill and their cousin Matthew Followill. Sons of a travelling Pentecostal preacher, they grew up moving through the South before settling near Nashville, arriving with a scrappy, Southern-inflected garage rock sound and a heavy debt to classic rock.

The band found its earliest audience in the United Kingdom, where its first three albums all reached the UK top five and Because of the Times went to number one. They picked up nine UK top 40 singles and two BRIT Awards in 2008, well before American radio caught on.

That changed with Only by the Night in 2008, which turned Kings of Leon into a stadium act worldwide. Sex on Fire, Use Somebody and Notion each topped the US modern rock chart, and the album became their first platinum seller in America. The band's sound had widened accordingly, trading early yelps for a bigger, echoing arena sound anchored by Caleb Followill's raw, slurred delivery.

Later albums, including Come Around Sundown, Mechanical Bull, Walls, When You See Yourself and Can We Please Have Fun, kept the group as a steady arena draw. Use Somebody won Record of the Year at the Grammys in 2010, one of four Grammy wins from twelve nominations. Live sets still move between the anthems and the rougher early material.

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