kings of leon - because of THE times

Dave Hood knows nothing about good music

how can any reviewer give this album 1/5?? dave hood obviously doesnt know what he is talking about!!! i believe the album is worth 4/5.

agreed

i agree, why does every band the hits big mainstream want to sound like U2 e.g. killers, coldplay, snow patrol etc...

*grabs gang of four, wire and killing joke cd's and thanks god that something good existed at some point in time....

are you kiding me??

this is my favorite kings of leon album!
it deserves waaaay more than a one out of five!

rocking

KOL were truly rocking last night.

The first time i saw them a couple of years ago i passed out afterwards and this time i remembered why, i basically shook my brain into jelly cos they make me dance so hard.

they are one of the tightest bands i've ever seen and have really changed since the last time i saw them. even the songs from the 1st and 2nd album had changed, they don't sound like they do on the album anymore which is cool, it's good to know they are developing the way the songs are played over time, makes the songs more alive innit. it's propa stadium rock now.

caleb's voice has so much more control, sometimes it sounded like he wasn't losing it as much on the screamy bits which i missed but that must have been killing his vocal chords. he really has an incredible voice. like how kim gordon could read a shopping list and it would make you drool, he could sing a bible tract and you'd think it was the sexiest thing ever.

so ok i only got the new album yesterday and didn't have much time to listen to it before the gig. on first listening i was disappointed because it wasn't as "instant" as the first 2 albums. i got all caught up in the production differences, thinking there was too much reverb on everything and the guitars didn't have that dirty warm happy orange tone anymore, they sounded more metally and power-chordy. i thought they used to be "my" band and now they were someone else's band and i was kind of mad at them.

But it could be a grower.

everyone i spoke to at the gig said they felt the same on first listen and then after a couple of weeks they think it's the best album so far.

so i don't know. report back here in 2 weeks?

as i left hammersmith apollo i passed 3 different groups (not within hearing distance of each other) all going "WAAAAAAAAHHHOW!!! She's Such A Charmer Oh No!!"

Retard

How retarded can you be?? The new Kings of Leon cd is amazing. They tried new things, so what? They still stuck to their roots and to their influences, and they still made a great record. You must not really know what you're talking about.

I am a huge Kings of Leon

I am a huge Kings of Leon fan and think they are the best thing to come out of America in the last 5 or 6 years. I love the first two records. They were fresh and exciting and came out of nowhere. Unfortunately Because of the Times is just ok. I’m actually disappointed. It has nothing to do with production. Bands have to expand and try different things. The songs are just not there. There are good tracks. My pics are Mcfearless, Black Thumbnail and Fans. The others fall short really hard. Charmer sounds like an outtake from a Pixies record, Surfer Rosa or Tromp Le Monde. On call is just boring except for the bridge. On that tip there are bits of music in several songs which I think are cool, like Knocked Up and Trunk. But in my opinion, the lyrics to a song like Knocked Up in particular are not as big as the music. Maybe i’m sick of bands glorifying and romanticising teenage or unwanted pregnancies. And the lyrics on this record are left to be desired. On YAYM and Aha they were daring, painfully honest,and self deprecating, and hilarious. On this record those lyrics just stumble. Fans is cool, and Charmer has some good lines, but the rest of the record I feel like Caleb is just boasting and taking himself way too seriously. And there’s nothing wrong with being serious, but the Kings are known to celebrate everything in their music. On Because of the Times they are just celebrating their pride. The Kings will still be Kings in my book but I’ll be there waiting for the next record.

KOL

So, Kings Of Leon are a massive, MASSIVE bone of contention it seems. The album - a world apart from their retro rock country stylings. I don't think it's utterly terrible. It's quite intriguing in places - but it is overstretched and it is not going to win over anyone who wasn't a fan before (I remember your review of the second album on the oldskool site Dave:P) or even win over current fans.
I must admit it was kind of strange to read an Artrocker cover story that was all about rock star image over substance too. Still, the cover looks very nice:)

i laughed so hard i nearly puked up all over the computer!

.when you said 'when they try and be Bloc party they FAIL!'.hahahaha....excuse me, HAAAAA HAAAA FUCKING HAAAAAAA- BLOC PARTY ARE WANK STAINS PERSONIFIED, they are the shittest most whiny pathetic wimps and listening to their music is like watching an incontinent 70 year old piss through a tube.

dont make me laugh....actually do, say something even MORE ridiculous, go on...you know you can Dave....

Dave Hood should shtick to his knitting

I'm with the 'Mincer' (is that how you spell it?). Dave Hood is a crap journo and has offended the Kings of Leon's only fan (Mincer). Honestly Dave, you should apologise and stick to what your good at - tree houses. Which are, of course, a whole lot more solid than this album.

PS: Clearly you're a rugby fan given all your references to 'Bott' (so obviously gay).

dave hood is a shit journalist

...go back to that crappy polytechnic you scraped a GNVQ in journalism at and do a course in being less of a TWAT instead- you are clearly as inept at LISTENING to music as you are at writing about it. Just about every other credible journalist in the country has managed to give this album the write up it surely deserves. fuck off and go back to litening to the klaxons on repeat you vile waste of space. just because you're a talentless ugly knob doesnt mean everyone has to suffer your inferiority complex. 'its a miserable failure of an album' is it? lets see how many copies it sells and then we'll talk about who the failure is.

I also think this magazine makes you look like even more of a tit by putting kings of leon on their cover!!!!!!!

It's total crap

I completely agree. This album is one big confused mess. I get irritated by Kings of Leon producing albums as bad as this, because they're capable of so much better.

On Because of the Times, the influences are so obvious, it's like the band sat down with paper and pen and planned the album out song by song, noting down who they were going to rip off on each track.

The opener is tedious U2-lite (which is pretty fucking lite). It meanders around and the singer steals some lyrics from a public information pamphlet about the dangers of teenage pregnancy. It's one of those tunes that flits about at the start in such an obviously timid way, that you know there's going to be a noisy rousing loud bit any second. Except the noisy rousing loud bit is a dull dirge with a single redeeming feature - it drowns out the singer's whining.

Track 2 sees the Pixies popping into the studio to teach the Kings how to play more interesting riffs. It’s such a rip off they should be paying Black Francis royalties. Someone seems to keep treading on the singer’s foot because he yelps like a little baby every few seconds. It's ridiculous.

Track 3, and they’ve found the reverb button. This time, James Hetfield of Metallica has popped his head round the door, and introduced them to power chords. He neglected to tell them when they work, and when they don’t. They don’t work in this song.

By the time they get to track 4, one of the band has been leant an emo album by Bloc Party. It’s hopeless. “I might easily give up on the show” sings Caleb. Me too. At that point I gave up on the album...

There may be hidden gems later on, but I couldn't be arsed to find them. A quick skip through the remaining tracks confirmed that the whole thing forges on with the Kings of Leon self indulgently experimenting beyond their capabilities.

They've over stretched themselves with this mess, and it's a miserable failure of an album.