Kings of Leon are a band who is seven albums into their career and still trying to figure out who they are and where they fit within the music world. When you think of them what comes to mind first are the crunchy Southern style guitars and lead singer Caleb Followill’s distinctively slurry vocals. On Walls, their first album since 2013’s Mechanical Bull, they seem to be going towards a more melodic pop country sound and away from their typical gritty Southern rock style. Much more of the album has a sound that would fit perfectly on Top 40 radio rather than on a rock station. Some of it sounds a little forced like producer Markus Dravs (Coldplay, Mumford & Sons) had to really rein them in to get the sound he wanted. While other tracks, like “Muchacho” and title track “Walls”, are organic sounding and really show what they are capable of. Glad to see the band in which the members were for a while not even speaking to each other are back at it.
Kings of Leon – Walls
