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 usty Springfield may have sung about the son of a preacher man, but Caleb Followill lived the life. As a little boy, Followill combed through the South with his Pentecostal preacher father and his brothers Nathan and Jared. Along with cousin Matthew, the brothers Followill formed Kings of Leon, a rock band whose trademarks include raunchy lyrics, raunchy guitars, and raunchy stories about raunchy groupies. You could say they left the church and found the Rolling Stones.The band's critically acclaimed 2003 debut, Youth and Young Manhood, made them superstars in England, but never quite broke through back home. Perhaps their hipster heartland look (tight jeans, full beards) and evangelical upbringing went over better in the land of tea and biscuits. But Kings of Leon may make their mark on America yet. Their new album, Because of the Times, debuted at #25 on Billboard, their highest ranking yet. It's a dark, noisy journey into the dick-swinging male ego, with songs about fucking, fighting and leaving before dawn. As lead singer and songwriter Caleb points out, he's actually softened his edges somewhat. For instance, nowhere on this album will you find the word "
So you guys have spent your lives touring. Which country has the hottest women? This is hard. Spain is amazing. Anywhere in South America. America has beautiful girls, and Australia. But I'd have to say South America. Where in South America ? Argentina. They're just all naturally beautiful, and they can't speak English, so there's this cloud of mystery about what being said. It's kind of hot. You don't really know what each other's saying. I mean, you could get a little book out, but that's no fun. It makes you appreciate the looks they give. I'm big on eyes. Eyes are pretty hot. Where do you get more attention from women — England or America ? England, probably. Well, at our shows, we always do okay. But just as far as as walking down the street? Girls would probably laugh at us walking down the street in America, because our pants are kinda snug, our hair's a mess. But if they come to our shows, we can win them over. You write a lot of songs about groupies. Are those based on real-life experiences? Yeah, some of them. I'm trying to become less personal in my songwritng. It's just a lot easier to write a song that I've experienced or I've watched somebody else in my band go through. Plus you meet certain types of girls, and you can figure them out kind of quickly. I feel like I can sit in the corner of a party and write a song about a girl I see. Can you give me an example off this album? "Arizona." That's pretty much word for word about a girl. And "My Party." None of the things in the verse are true, I'm just kind of being cocky there, but the chorus is true. It's about me being happy this girl made it to the party. Who gets the most groupies in the band? We all do all right. Our standards have changed a little bit. Some of the guys have girlfriends now, so I'm gonna say they don't get any groupies at all. But for the rest of us, it just depends on who wants it more. And usually I want it more than the other guys. What do you mean when you say your standards have changed? In the beginning we were really going for it. We liked the whole lifestyle, it's great. I'm glad that happened. I got a lot of songs out of it. But now, I mean, I guess I prefer a beautiful woman. Not always, but a beautiful woman is nice. What's the craziest thing that's ever happened with a groupie? Aww, shit. You don't need to know about it, probably. I'm assuming the song "Knocked Up" [about impregnating a woman] isn't something that's happened to you. Where did that story come from? Some of it comes from fear and close calls. We've been accused of things and we've had people say that we have children and it's just bullshit, it's just people trying to get attention. But it kinda makes you think. Now I have a lot of land, and at the end of the day, as I was admiring the things I had, I also realized I kind of didn't have anyone to share it with. And I questioned if I was man enough to stand up for a challenge like that if it were to come along. Do you want to have kids? Oh, yeah. Not right now, but eventually. I would love to have a son. I would love to have a son that looked like me, and acted like me. Like you? That sounds like a handful. Probably. But I'd know what to do with him. I'd know just how to handle him. In the song "Black Thumbnail," you sing that you have a cold cold sailor heart. Is that true? I don't know if I have a cold heart, exactly. We've traveled our whole lives. I've found it really hard to put my trust into a relationship. We've always had to say goodbye. I've been better at saying goodbye than the opposite. But you're still young. You're what, twenty-four? I'm twenty-five. I know I'm young. But I'm an old soul. [laughs] Has it always been hard to have relationships? Did you have a girlfriend growing up? I had one when I was eleven years old that I liked for a while. Then I had one in high school. But since I've been on the road, it's more about the time that I have. I work really hard and I have a lot of stuff to do, and for a while I was scared and selfish and didn't want to share this with anyone. It's not easy talking with a girl, and she's a million miles away. She asks me about how my day went, and you know, a lot of amazing things can happen in my day. And I ask her how her day was, and pretty soon, after a while, it's the same routine, I know what's going on with her, and all she wants to talk about is what happened to me. I don't know. I think I need to be at home to be with a woman. And there must be a lot of jealousy when you're apart for so long. That's what makes it kind of tough. If someone's not around, how can they expect to get involved and watch over you from a million miles away? The Pitchfork review of your last album said your lyrics were misogynistic. How do you respond to that? I don't know. I've always been really honest with lyrics and things I saw. I've always appreciated people that were honest and said things that pissed you off. I think honesty is key. I have said things in the past that people don't want to hear, but it's all been true. That's the thing that I'm most proud of in my lyrics. I don't want my mom to have to shield her ears all the time, but I want the lyrics to be honest. Does your mom listen to everything you do? Yeah, she does. I just gave her a copy of the new record. She's been begging for it. With this record I'm pretty wholesome. I say "asshole" one time. Every song doesn't have to be about sex. Knowing that your mom's gonna listen to your songs, does it force you to censor yourself? Not just my mom. I just have to censor myself. I want to say things that are completely unacceptable. I want to use words that people are like, "Why would you ever say that?" But I always liked it when people were risky with their lyrics. I mean, Johnny Cash wrote about killing a man. What other lyricists do you like? Townes Van Zandt I love, love, love. Roger Miller. A lot of times Roger Miller's songs seem goofy and funny, but he's the saddest songwriter I know. "Little Green Apples" is one of the saddest songs I've ever heard. And he makes the best drinking music ever. I notice your voice is particularly raspy on this album. How many cigarettes do you have to smoke to get your voice to sound like that? Well, I used to smoke a lot. I quit after Aha Shake Heartbreak. But you're right, I was smoking again during the recording of this album. I'm kind of a closet smoker. I would smoke one in public and then smoke the rest inside. I'm just like that with tobacco. Man, I love it. I'm not smoking now. But I just went camping, and I did chew some tobacco. You named the album Because of the Times after a Pentecostal conference you used to go to as a kid. What were those conferences like? It's something that brings up great memories. Preachers used to bring their kids. It was the one time a year we'd meet our friends and see the girls we'd fallen in love with the year before. We'd get dudded up in suits and run around while our parents were being revived or whatever. We always knew this album would be called Because of the Times. It's the answer to every question that people have ever asked about our band. If this record does blow up, it's because of the times. If this record flops, it's because of the times. Regardless, we made a record that's really good. n°
© 2007 Sarah Hepola & hooksexup.com |
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