kings-of-leon-can-we-please-have-fun-2024-review
This is the “slow burner” of the record, but don’t expect Come Around Sundown balladry. Instead, we get a psychedelic, reverb-drenched meditation that sounds like Tame Impala produced by Brian Eno. Nathan Followill’s drums are programmed, manipulated, and looped—a first for the band.
Produced with a looser, almost live-in-the-studio feel, the album opens with a 90-second noise-rock sketch that sounds less like “Radioactive” and more like The Stooges crashing a church social. It’s disorienting. It’s great. “Balloon in a Hurricane” (Track 2) The first single proper is a red herring—catchy, sure, but lyrically chaotic. Caleb Followill’s drawl is more unhinged than it’s been since Mechanical Bull , slurring existential dread over a bassline that Matthew Followill hasn’t let himself play in years. It’s sexy and anxious.
The “hit.” It’s the only track that nods to their arena past, but even here, the chorus implodes into a feedback-laden coda. If radio picks this up, it’ll be the strangest rock song on Top 40 in a decade. The Verdict Does Can We Please Have Fun sound like a band trying to recapture their youth? No. It sounds like a band that finally stopped caring about chart positions and started caring about vibrations .
Here’s a blog post developed from your prompt, written in an engaging, music-blog style. Kings of Leon’s Can We Please Have Fun (2024): A Band Reborn, or Just Letting Loose?