Shane’s Rock Challenge: KINGS OF LEON – 2003 – Youth & Young Manhood

Shane’s Rock Challenge: KINGS OF LEON – 2003 – Youth & Young Manhood
9/10

Forget all their over-produced radio friendly unit shifters, their preening posturing to entice teenage girls to spend up big on posters and merch, and their hipster alt-rock hits – Kings Of Leon’s debut album is where it’s at, man.

Full of greasy licks and Southern twang, Youth & Young Manhood is moonshine-fuelled, God-fearin’, swampy blues rock of the finest order, played by the Followill brothers (plus one cousin), all of whom, incidentally, go by their middle names rather than their first. Children of a Pentecostal preacher, the Followills were brought up in Tennessee and Oklahoma, and moved to Nashville after their parents divorced, where they discovered the demon rock and roll and the joys of growing long hair and beards.

The results speak for themselves – its blues rock served with chicken-fried-steak and a side of grits, all led by Caleb’s auctioneer-speed drawled vocals.

Red Morning Light, Wasted Time, the sublime California Waiting and the ripping Holy Roller Novocaine are all fantastic visceral songs are equal parts rock, blues and groove. Molly’s Chambers sends their southern blues through a time warp and back where it picks up the slightest flavour of some kind of Celtic jig, and O Dusty is twilight front porch music as you pass the moonshine jug around.

And then there’s Talihina Sky, which splices the southern rock DNA with an almost Hawaiian folk song vibe to excellent effect.

The teens may get all hot n’ heavy thinking that Sex On Fire is the coolest song ever, but anyone with a bit more knowledge of the blues and Southern rock will agree that Youth & Young Manhood pips anything they’ve done since by a fair margin.

By Shane Pinnegar

Category: Shane's Rock Challenge