Kings Of Leon - 'Charmer'
Kings of Leon tend to accrue critical acclaim for their distinctive sound, which, admittedly, is instantly recognisable within about the first thirty seconds of any of their songs. This wouldn't be a problem, many bands have instantly recognisable traits within their music (is there any mistaking a Girls Aloud song when it's incoming?) and having carved your own niche market is almost essential to the success of a band.
Unfortunately, for the Kings Of Leon, the upshot of this is that as they carve deeper and deeper into their niche, they slowly shut off the air from the outside world and begin to wallow only in their own sounds, reverberating around the tiny wooden space. The result of this sort of borderline-sensory deprivation is that as the sound reverbs and compacts, the consequent output the band squeeze out of their niche becomes ever more similar, to the point that although this song is very obviously a Kings of Leon song, it could also be just about any Kings of Leon song.
With only 27 different words in the lyrics and the line "she's such a charmer, oh no!" dominating the lyrical landscape to the point I nearly missed the almost parodically lazy lines "she stole my karma, oh no/sold it to the farmer, oh no," 'Charmer' isn't a beautifully crafted piece of innovative rock. Not that necessarily having the lyrics written by a coalition of Conor Oberst and Pete Wentz would make it any better but the not-usually-particularly-eloquent Kings of Leon are surely surpassing themselves with this one.
Rock doesn't have to be clever, neither does it have to be particularly innovative - if it did then a decent slab of my music taste would probably have to be written off as utter rubbish, dragged out back and burnt. But on the other hand, rock does have to be at least reasonably interesting. The slow, disinterested drawl of Caleb Followill, interspersed with yelping that does nothing to alter the steady decline of the song into the sludge of possibly the most mind-numbing bassline outside of sludge-metal is simply disappointing from a band who have a capacity to make really quite interesting music, even if it's not entirely to my taste.
'King Of The Rodeo's' garbled lyrics and handclap rhythm are nowhere to be seen here and it's hard to imagine exactly what you're meant to do to this song; dancing would seem a bit out of the question and equally it's too obnoxious to sing along or laze around in your bedroom to. Possibly this will appeal to their hardcore fanbase but I doubt it's going to win them any new friends.
Download: Out now
(Hazel Robinson)
Comments
so charmer might not be KOL's best song, bu surely it's not that bad!
and maybe this song isn't about singing along or anything, but it could be for gigs, cos its a pretty mint song for them to play live
but, in fairness, i am a hardcore fan and will worship them no matter what. but even a hardcore fan like me really didn't see them releasing this as a single
i am a hardcore fan and will worship them no matter what.
What, even if they embark upon a campaign of genocide in the Congo?
Or turn into a Steps tribute band?
Or just keep slowly getting worse and worse?
FACT! When their first record came out, a now former acquaintance recommended them to me on the following basis; "You'll love them, they've got beards too!"
Hence, former acquaintance.
Ah i like this, it reminds me of one of my friends who yelps a bit like that...
I love KOL because of their distinctiveness, i think really without the little yelps it'd be pretty boring anyway.
Sure, it's not 'beautifully crafted' to perfection but it's a good track. me likes.
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