It was just one of those perfect gigs that will stick in your memory forever. A beautiful summers evening and Kings of Leon, Second to last on the bill to Razorlight, troop on to the stage to play to the biggest crowd of the weekend. The opening chords to Black Thumbnail reverberate through the speakers and the crowd goes suitably insane.
Fast forward 2 years and Kings are back, but this time headlining off the back of a couple of huge radio hits, which won them a whole new fan base. This should be a crowning moment for the band, but something has changed. They’re met by stony faces and polite applause. The whole atmosphere is awkward, and this winds the band up so much they have a hissy fit and storm off the stage at the end of there set. A guitar even goes flying into the crowd. So what has changed?
Kings of Leon used to be one of the coolest bands in the world. They had a modest, but steadily growing group of fanatical fans. They managed to headline Glastonbury without ever having a top ten hit. Then the song Sex on Fire came out and everything went crazy in the world of the Kings.
There is no denying some hardcore music fans are irrationally fickle. At my university there was a group of musos I knew who would dance to a band one week, the band would get some radio play, and the next time the DJ played them they would stand resolutely at the side of the dance floor waiting for the song to finish.
The less fickle fans, however, just find it very difficult to share. It is a strange thing experiencing a band you’ve loved since their humble beginnings being played on Capital FM 37 times a day. Bands you ironically spent 10 years telling anyone who would listen how great they were. With people like this there is an acceptable level of success. I saw Arcade Fire playing the O2 in November. “It’s strange. We’ve sold out this ginormous arena for 2 nights and we’ve never even had a hit.” Said front man Win Butler towards the end of a wonderful gig. And in there lies the secret to keeping your fan base.
Kings of Leon are now one of the biggest bands in the world. They sell out stadiums and sell records by the truckload. Yet they’ve lost most of the fans that propelled them to a position to take over the world. It’s not their fault they came up with such an excruciatingly catchy song. Its not there fault the whole world loved it. You cannot begrudge them their success. But I miss the little band that only a couple of people had heard of. I wish that song had never happened, but it did. Sometimes you’ve just got to let them go.
No comments:
Post a Comment