Post by kbstroman on May 31, 2007 21:21:48 GMT
Hey all, I did a search to see if this article had been posted... I don't think it has. If so, my apologies.
Anyway, it's pretty damn funny.
generalpants.com.au/our_people/our_people/the_kings_of_leon_interview/
The Kings Of Leon Interview
Ge
Written by Our People
Friday, 30 March 2007
Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll!
Guaranteed to leave you dubious about their good Christian roots.
By Lulu Browett.
The Kings of Leon
It’s always the nerdy girl at school who ends up flashing her tits at schoolies, wrapping her lips around a doobie and tipping Tequila shots down her neck like lemonade. Likewise, the geek with the draconian parents ends with the smack addiction, while the rest of us roll along making the standard teenage mistakes and tumbling into adulthood with relatively normal levels of messed-up-edness. All of which perhaps explains the Kings of Leon in their current form. The boys (Nathan, Caleb and Jared are brothers, Matthew is their cousin) were raised in a strict religious family, and spent most of their childhood travelling around with their father, a United Pentecostal church preacher, being home-schooled by their mother and playing church music. Once they could speak for themselves, they made the cr-aaaazy move to playing country music at rodeos, before shunning it all to play rock and roll, baby! Seems that the rumours you hear about good Christian girls can apply to boys too, as drummer Nathan was all to happy to share what these wholesome lads have supposedly been up to – bugle habits, gangbangs, beers with Bono and moose-knuckle tight jeans… don’t recall learning those moves in Bible studies.
Just lit my speakers up with the new album – would I be wrong in feeling a little bit more country in there than the first?
Country sounding… hmm, I don’t know… well, it was the first album we’ve recorded at home in Nashville so maybe we were a little influenced.
A lot of people are surprised to learn you are from the US because your sound and look seem to be straight outta London. Seeing as the US mainly offers us rap and pop, do you ever feel like you are representing the entire US indie scene?
As far as American radio and MTV and shit like that goes, we can’t control what gets played and we’re not losing any sleep over it. Actually, it’s great. We’ve always wanted to be one of those bands that fly under the radar, so we’re happy.
Obviously with iTunes and MySpace, the way people are accessing music is different. How has this affected you?
I was definitely addicted to MySpace there for a little while. I am down to checking my messages only seven times a day now, which is great for me! [Laughs]. It’s amazing how bands get found… I heard about Gnarls Barkley through MySpace and checked them out and thought they were cool and that made me realise that you can find good music that way – and they have such a wide variety, it’s not just one particular type. And iTunes – I have spent more on that than I have on food this year, I swear to God. It’s cool because people can choose what they want to listen to now, they don’t just have to take what’s being offered to them.
Onto other more pressing matters – the jeans that you cowboys rock are wildly tight. Do you skin up in girls jeans?
We buy girls jeans and then we have our mother alter and tailor them.
Full Mummy’s boys…
Oh yeah. She cuts all of our hair and tightens our jeans. It’s pretty good.
Tennessee sure sounds like a redneck town. What’s the most redneck thing you’ve done?
Actually, the most redneck thing I’ve done is drink beer through a straw – and I learnt that in Australia!
Who taught you that?
One of the guys in Gerling. They taught us this trick with a beer and a straw and one gulp and the beer is down your throat and you can’t even help it. It’s quite amazing. That was the most redneck thing but unfortunately it wasn’t done in Tennessee. Probably the most redneck thing I do now is spit. I don’t do it all the time, but if I’ve been watching baseball I’ll spit for like, two or three days afterwards. Just to be manly and American. But for the most part, I save the spit for the stage.
You’re not involving tobacco, are you?
Oh no way. But when I was young, I used to put beef jerky in my lip and fake like it was chewing tobacco.
Growing up, which of you was the Golden Child with the parents?
The kid that can do no wrong… oh boy… Jared probably got away with the most but Matt was the most spoilt, for sure. I was the oldest so I couldn’t do anything, they were too scared I would break! By the time the others came along, they could do what they liked. They do shit now that if I had done when I was 20 my mum would have hit me upside the head.
If you could go back to yourself at this time last year and say one thing, what would it be?
Don’t do cocaine. Seriously. I would say Save your money! And stay away from that one Vietnamese girl…
Um…
She knows who she is… [laughs]. Nah, I’m joking.
Did anything not happen in the last few years that you wish would have happened?
Oh man, we’ve had so many great things. The U2 tour, the Bob Dylan tour, and now we’re on tour with Pearl Jam. Those are three bands that most bands would kill to tour with once in their lives. And we got three in less than two years. Probably the next point would be to see if we can get all three of them to open for us…
An extravaganza…
Yeah. In Vietnam.
Nice, you can catch up with your family over there.
Definitely! I’m behind on my child support as it is…
You and U2 were in Australia at the same time, did you get to catch up?
Yeah, we got to hang out in Sydney. It was the day of the US elections, and we read in the papers the next day, “Bono, Pearl Jam and Kings of Leon celebrate the victory in America” of whatever it was, Republicans, Democrats… we’re probably the least political band in the world. First of all, Jared can’t even vote yet. Matt can’t even vote because I think he has a suspended licence and me and Caleb are usually drunk on election day. It was kinda funny that we were cast as celebrating the election.
Did Bono get in your ear about it? He froths off that stuff!
Caleb got that talk. Which was… great. I was cheers’ing him with my beer from across the room. He had cotton mouth over there, with Bono just talking and talking…
You could have taken him a beer!
I didn’t want to interrupt the… moment. Nah, they’re great guys. They’re sweethearts and we had fun with them. They definitely don’t act the way you think they would, or the way they are portrayed.
What, do they like to party?
Nah, they’re just chill. Everyone thinks Bono is this super serious guy but he has great stories to tell and he can drink a mean vodka tonic!
He’s a wild man after all…
With the charity stuff he’s done he could fucken go off the deep end and no one could say anything about it.
Who is the coolest person you’ve met?
I could be like a little cocky punk…
Do it.
Well, I was gonna say Howie from the Backstreet Boys but that’s probably not too rock and roll…
Was he the one who went through rehab?
I don’t know. But how the hell can you be a Backstreet Boy and go through rehab? Hey, do you have that beer in Australia that has Red Bull in it?
No…
Oh you wait, it’s gonna take you guys by storm! It’s not actual Red Bull mixed with beer, it’s beer with the certain component of Red Bull that makes you wired. It’s called Spark. It’s an energy beer that gets you drunk, but party-all-night style drunk. Let’s bring it out there together! I’m telling you, it will hit and you’ll be like, “Oh, Nathan told me about that…” We can bring it out and take a cut each!
Speaking of beer, tell me a time when you’ve had a class-A hangover and had to back up the next day?
While I was in Australia. I was hungover for two days afterwards. What was I NOT drinking? You know, you have wine with dinner, then you get to the venue and you wanna have a couple of beers to calm your nerves. Then you have a shot before you go on to get your juices flowing. Then you drink beer throughout the show. Then after the show, everybody and their Mum wants to buy you shots. And then someone comes in from the label with a nice bottle of champagne to celebrate your big show. And before you know it, you’ve drunken every type of alcohol, in just three hours and tonnes of it. I had so many mornings while on tour in Australia where I’ve woken up and had a big swig of wine to just take the edge off.
Spoken like a true wild man! A big swig of wine for breakfast!
Mmm, delicious.
What’s the best line a girl has busted out on you since you’ve been famous?
Girls don’t really use lines. Not the ones I meet anyway. The best move would have to be when we walked on the tour bus one time and there was a girl just laid out watching satellite TV. She was just laying there and we were like, “What the hell… how the hell did you get on our bus?” And she was like, “My friend let me on.” And we said, “Where’s your friend at?” And we went to the back of the bus and her friend was laying out at the lounge, watching TV. Just waiting for the first one of us to come back there, I guess. So we went oldest to youngest, which is the tradition in Tennessee.
You did not just tell me that.
That is off the record. I better not see that in print.
Dude, that could definitely be the most redneck moment, right there – oldest to youngest!
I think I’ve said too much. [Laughs].
So if someone wanted to replicate such moves, or merely talk their way backstage, what would they have to say?
Just “Hi” to our cousin Nacho, who is the guitar tech. He’s got it made, because he’s our cousin so he looks just like us and he’s got our same last name, except he doesn’t have the wild persona, so people feel very comfortable around him. And they know that he will be where we’re at later on. You get the best of both worlds.
So when have you felt most like a rock and roll superstar?
Whenever we’re walking around with our two huge security guards. We use them mostly at after parties. Because you do meet some crazy girls. Not groupies that want to get with you but people who think you “have a connection.”
Is there a secret signal?
Yes, we give the signal, turn our head, turn back and they’re gone!
So if we’re ever having a conversation, what’s the signal I should look for?
If you see me cross my eyes, you better get the hell outta there because you’re fixing to be in a world of pain!
The Kings’ eclectic new album Because Of The Times is due for release next month.
Anyway, it's pretty damn funny.
generalpants.com.au/our_people/our_people/the_kings_of_leon_interview/
The Kings Of Leon Interview
Ge
Written by Our People
Friday, 30 March 2007
Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll!
Guaranteed to leave you dubious about their good Christian roots.
By Lulu Browett.
The Kings of Leon
It’s always the nerdy girl at school who ends up flashing her tits at schoolies, wrapping her lips around a doobie and tipping Tequila shots down her neck like lemonade. Likewise, the geek with the draconian parents ends with the smack addiction, while the rest of us roll along making the standard teenage mistakes and tumbling into adulthood with relatively normal levels of messed-up-edness. All of which perhaps explains the Kings of Leon in their current form. The boys (Nathan, Caleb and Jared are brothers, Matthew is their cousin) were raised in a strict religious family, and spent most of their childhood travelling around with their father, a United Pentecostal church preacher, being home-schooled by their mother and playing church music. Once they could speak for themselves, they made the cr-aaaazy move to playing country music at rodeos, before shunning it all to play rock and roll, baby! Seems that the rumours you hear about good Christian girls can apply to boys too, as drummer Nathan was all to happy to share what these wholesome lads have supposedly been up to – bugle habits, gangbangs, beers with Bono and moose-knuckle tight jeans… don’t recall learning those moves in Bible studies.
Just lit my speakers up with the new album – would I be wrong in feeling a little bit more country in there than the first?
Country sounding… hmm, I don’t know… well, it was the first album we’ve recorded at home in Nashville so maybe we were a little influenced.
A lot of people are surprised to learn you are from the US because your sound and look seem to be straight outta London. Seeing as the US mainly offers us rap and pop, do you ever feel like you are representing the entire US indie scene?
As far as American radio and MTV and shit like that goes, we can’t control what gets played and we’re not losing any sleep over it. Actually, it’s great. We’ve always wanted to be one of those bands that fly under the radar, so we’re happy.
Obviously with iTunes and MySpace, the way people are accessing music is different. How has this affected you?
I was definitely addicted to MySpace there for a little while. I am down to checking my messages only seven times a day now, which is great for me! [Laughs]. It’s amazing how bands get found… I heard about Gnarls Barkley through MySpace and checked them out and thought they were cool and that made me realise that you can find good music that way – and they have such a wide variety, it’s not just one particular type. And iTunes – I have spent more on that than I have on food this year, I swear to God. It’s cool because people can choose what they want to listen to now, they don’t just have to take what’s being offered to them.
Onto other more pressing matters – the jeans that you cowboys rock are wildly tight. Do you skin up in girls jeans?
We buy girls jeans and then we have our mother alter and tailor them.
Full Mummy’s boys…
Oh yeah. She cuts all of our hair and tightens our jeans. It’s pretty good.
Tennessee sure sounds like a redneck town. What’s the most redneck thing you’ve done?
Actually, the most redneck thing I’ve done is drink beer through a straw – and I learnt that in Australia!
Who taught you that?
One of the guys in Gerling. They taught us this trick with a beer and a straw and one gulp and the beer is down your throat and you can’t even help it. It’s quite amazing. That was the most redneck thing but unfortunately it wasn’t done in Tennessee. Probably the most redneck thing I do now is spit. I don’t do it all the time, but if I’ve been watching baseball I’ll spit for like, two or three days afterwards. Just to be manly and American. But for the most part, I save the spit for the stage.
You’re not involving tobacco, are you?
Oh no way. But when I was young, I used to put beef jerky in my lip and fake like it was chewing tobacco.
Growing up, which of you was the Golden Child with the parents?
The kid that can do no wrong… oh boy… Jared probably got away with the most but Matt was the most spoilt, for sure. I was the oldest so I couldn’t do anything, they were too scared I would break! By the time the others came along, they could do what they liked. They do shit now that if I had done when I was 20 my mum would have hit me upside the head.
If you could go back to yourself at this time last year and say one thing, what would it be?
Don’t do cocaine. Seriously. I would say Save your money! And stay away from that one Vietnamese girl…
Um…
She knows who she is… [laughs]. Nah, I’m joking.
Did anything not happen in the last few years that you wish would have happened?
Oh man, we’ve had so many great things. The U2 tour, the Bob Dylan tour, and now we’re on tour with Pearl Jam. Those are three bands that most bands would kill to tour with once in their lives. And we got three in less than two years. Probably the next point would be to see if we can get all three of them to open for us…
An extravaganza…
Yeah. In Vietnam.
Nice, you can catch up with your family over there.
Definitely! I’m behind on my child support as it is…
You and U2 were in Australia at the same time, did you get to catch up?
Yeah, we got to hang out in Sydney. It was the day of the US elections, and we read in the papers the next day, “Bono, Pearl Jam and Kings of Leon celebrate the victory in America” of whatever it was, Republicans, Democrats… we’re probably the least political band in the world. First of all, Jared can’t even vote yet. Matt can’t even vote because I think he has a suspended licence and me and Caleb are usually drunk on election day. It was kinda funny that we were cast as celebrating the election.
Did Bono get in your ear about it? He froths off that stuff!
Caleb got that talk. Which was… great. I was cheers’ing him with my beer from across the room. He had cotton mouth over there, with Bono just talking and talking…
You could have taken him a beer!
I didn’t want to interrupt the… moment. Nah, they’re great guys. They’re sweethearts and we had fun with them. They definitely don’t act the way you think they would, or the way they are portrayed.
What, do they like to party?
Nah, they’re just chill. Everyone thinks Bono is this super serious guy but he has great stories to tell and he can drink a mean vodka tonic!
He’s a wild man after all…
With the charity stuff he’s done he could fucken go off the deep end and no one could say anything about it.
Who is the coolest person you’ve met?
I could be like a little cocky punk…
Do it.
Well, I was gonna say Howie from the Backstreet Boys but that’s probably not too rock and roll…
Was he the one who went through rehab?
I don’t know. But how the hell can you be a Backstreet Boy and go through rehab? Hey, do you have that beer in Australia that has Red Bull in it?
No…
Oh you wait, it’s gonna take you guys by storm! It’s not actual Red Bull mixed with beer, it’s beer with the certain component of Red Bull that makes you wired. It’s called Spark. It’s an energy beer that gets you drunk, but party-all-night style drunk. Let’s bring it out there together! I’m telling you, it will hit and you’ll be like, “Oh, Nathan told me about that…” We can bring it out and take a cut each!
Speaking of beer, tell me a time when you’ve had a class-A hangover and had to back up the next day?
While I was in Australia. I was hungover for two days afterwards. What was I NOT drinking? You know, you have wine with dinner, then you get to the venue and you wanna have a couple of beers to calm your nerves. Then you have a shot before you go on to get your juices flowing. Then you drink beer throughout the show. Then after the show, everybody and their Mum wants to buy you shots. And then someone comes in from the label with a nice bottle of champagne to celebrate your big show. And before you know it, you’ve drunken every type of alcohol, in just three hours and tonnes of it. I had so many mornings while on tour in Australia where I’ve woken up and had a big swig of wine to just take the edge off.
Spoken like a true wild man! A big swig of wine for breakfast!
Mmm, delicious.
What’s the best line a girl has busted out on you since you’ve been famous?
Girls don’t really use lines. Not the ones I meet anyway. The best move would have to be when we walked on the tour bus one time and there was a girl just laid out watching satellite TV. She was just laying there and we were like, “What the hell… how the hell did you get on our bus?” And she was like, “My friend let me on.” And we said, “Where’s your friend at?” And we went to the back of the bus and her friend was laying out at the lounge, watching TV. Just waiting for the first one of us to come back there, I guess. So we went oldest to youngest, which is the tradition in Tennessee.
You did not just tell me that.
That is off the record. I better not see that in print.
Dude, that could definitely be the most redneck moment, right there – oldest to youngest!
I think I’ve said too much. [Laughs].
So if someone wanted to replicate such moves, or merely talk their way backstage, what would they have to say?
Just “Hi” to our cousin Nacho, who is the guitar tech. He’s got it made, because he’s our cousin so he looks just like us and he’s got our same last name, except he doesn’t have the wild persona, so people feel very comfortable around him. And they know that he will be where we’re at later on. You get the best of both worlds.
So when have you felt most like a rock and roll superstar?
Whenever we’re walking around with our two huge security guards. We use them mostly at after parties. Because you do meet some crazy girls. Not groupies that want to get with you but people who think you “have a connection.”
Is there a secret signal?
Yes, we give the signal, turn our head, turn back and they’re gone!
So if we’re ever having a conversation, what’s the signal I should look for?
If you see me cross my eyes, you better get the hell outta there because you’re fixing to be in a world of pain!
The Kings’ eclectic new album Because Of The Times is due for release next month.
)
As a matter of fact all the Kings are super funny guys. Not to mention they truly are sweethearts. Love them!
