When you think of Kings of Leon, who stunned the crowds on Sunday at BST Hyde Park , your mind no doubt goes to the hedonistic and ridiculously catchy track that is Sex On Fire. Since its release in 2008, the hit – which spent an impressive three weeks at the number one spot in the UK charts – has become somewhat of an honorary national anthem (even though the band originates from Nashville, Tennessee). Prom night? Last orders? Football game? Go on then; let’s stick it on.
Even brothers Caleb and Jared Followill (the lead singer and bassist, respectively) don’t necessarily like performing it, but they’ve grown to appreciate the broader impact that it has had. In an interview with Radio X this year, for example, Caleb commented: ‘It’s one of those songs that we used to kind of..
. you don’t dread playing it, but it’s one of those things where you would just see how much bigger of a response it got to everything else and it made you feel bad for the rest of [the set]. ‘But then you get to a point of pride where you go, “Man we did this.
We wrote this song. Let’s go out there and enjoy it.”’ They needn’t worry though.
Yes, there will always be that crowd (especially after England clashed against Slovakia in the Euros and won 2-1 moments before their set) that bellows some incoherent slur that faintly resembles the lyrics. But there are also people out there – people like me – who relish the rest of their discography and know them to be more than .
