Kings of Leon (photo:) Live4ever
Saturday
Vampire Weekend brought out the late afternoon sun on Saturday with a typically cheerful, breezy performance. It’s perfect for the time of day, and the now established favourites from their eponymous debut album fully deliver the goods and are met with the same amount of enthusiasm that the band continues to deliver them with. The group also manage to keep the crowd entertained and engaged while playing a selection of new songs – something other acts have failed to do so far. Overall it’s yet another accomplished performance from a band who are fast becoming one of the most reliable festival acts on the circuit. It’s hard to imagine a time when ‘A-Punk’ won’t put smiles on the faces of all who go to see them.
Later, Yeah Yeah Yeahs confirm a stronger afternoon/evening than the day before with a powerful performance of their rock-disco tunes. Despite not acknowledging the crowd until the closing stages, frontwoman Karen O, decked out in an outfit straight out of 1970s wrestling, shows why she is one of the most engaging singers on the planet, working the crowd effortlessly. Her boundless enthusiasm is impossible to resist and the band show their versatility when things are slowed down for an acoustic rendition of ‘Maps’ which is even more haunting and passionate in it’s stripped down form. Songs from their under-rated new album ‘It’s Blitz!‘ sit well with the established hits such as ‘Gold Lion’ and set closer ‘Date With The Night’, and the performance shows them up as one of the stronger live acts on show at this year’s festival.
Saturday Headliners – Radiohead
Whenever Radiohead are confirmed as headliners, a buzz around the lucky festival develops. Over their career, they have gained a reputation as one of the best festival bands ever, thanks mainly to their 1997 and 2003 Glastonbury appearances, and after the amateurish headline outing by Arctic Monkeys the night before, again hopes were raised that such a seasoned act would deliver the goods. However, once more, the gig could only be described as a let down by those craving a defining festival performance.
While being nowhere near as poor as Arctic Monkeys were the night before, Radiohead again fall on the side of their own wishes and those of their hardcore fans, rather than appeasing the festival crowd which is bound to be made up largely of more casual fans, or those who are hoping to be introduced to the band for the first time. For the second night in a row, the mass sing-alongs and smiles which they can bring are not delivered, and by the time the band do reel out old favourites, ‘Paranoid Android‘ and ‘Just’, right at the end, at least 40% of the crowd has already wandered off to find their thrills elsewhere. It was more like a run-of-the-mill Radiohead gig, rather than a special festival headline appearance which demands a special set-list.
The performance was by no means a poor one. The talented band members as always deliver a gig high on musical craftsmanship and ability. The album tracks which punctuate the set, coupled with an impressive light and video display, are engaging enough, and it’s hard not to marvel at the obvious talents of the band. However, it was this musical ability and prowess, coupled with their mainstream 90s hits, which has made some of their other festival appearances, especially their 2003 Glastonbury headline show, stuff of legend and the lack of any classic singles in the main bulk of the set turns off sections of the crowd.
The devoted Radiohead fans who were amongst the crowd would no doubt have gone away more than happy, but by the end it seemed these were the only ones who had stayed to wave the band goodbye. As the huge crowds spilling out of the tents which housed La Roux and Lostprophets at the same time come in to view on the way out, it becomes quickly clear where the large sections of the crowd who left had settled to enjoy their evening after losing interest in Radiohead.
For the second night in a row, it’s hard not to feel robbed of another potentially great headline performance, and with news sweeping through of Kings Of Leon’s premature departure from the Reading stage on Friday, the reality that this year’s festival would be robbed of any defining gig becomes likely. Thankfully, Kings Of Leon would sign off a sensational 18 months in the UK with one of their most memorable gigs to date, and in doing so make the 2009 Leeds Festival their own.
As many began to pack their things away ready for the mad dash home after tonight’s headliners, the feeling that this year had so far been a major let down was inescapable. One could only hope the top two tonight of Kaiser Chiefs and Kings Of Leon could finally deliver what the Main Stage crowd desperately wants.
Sunday
Before then, The Airborne Toxic Event showed their potential to a respectable afternoon crowd on the Radio 1/NME Stage. The indie dance floor favourite ‘Does This Mean You’re Moving On?’ and their biggest hit to date ‘Sometime Around Midnight’, which hit the UK top 40 in August 2008, both go down well alongside other tracks from their self-titled debut album.
Later, London newcomers The Big Pink draw passers-by into the Festival Republic tent in their droves throughout their set. The hugely talented duo storm through songs from soon-to-be-released debut ‘A Brief History Of Love’ in no time. Silent in between songs, they allow their music to do the talking, and it’s more than enough to keep the ever-increasing crowd happy. New single ‘Dominos’ is an early favourite in their set, while set-closer ‘Velvet’ is a truly extraordinary piece of songwriting that feels even more special live. It already is one of the songs of they year and is the best indication of the talents of the duo which should see them playing to much larger crowds before long. Their songs are delivered with an atmospheric sound that brings Glasvegas to mind, but their more electro/dance feel – helped no end by the presence of a DJ on stage – bring to mind the best of late eighties Madchester, and sets them apart from many of their current contemporaries. Definitely one to watch.
…and so to the Main Stage for the culmination to the weekend. Like their more lauded Yorkshire
contemporaries Arctic Monkeys, The Kaiser Chiefs had their work on to fail in front of their hometown fans, but unlike the Sheffield band, the Chiefs showed no signs of complacency as they worked the crowd effortlessly and finally gave the Main Stage audience a memorable, crowd pleasing show.
They have struggled since the release of third album ‘Off With Their Heads‘, and despite the best efforts of the crowd, the songs do lack the charm which swept through their first two records. However, obvious favourites such as ‘I Predict a Riot’ and ‘Ruby’ go down a storm – they are songs which will not define an era or change the musical landscape, however they are perfect for these types of occasions, and frontman Ricky Wilson works the crowd effortlessly. While splitting the crowd into halves to shout ‘Kaiser’ and ‘Chiefs’ is rather toe-curling and eventually tiresome, it does serve to keep an audience which seems to have been ignored over the past two nights feeling totally engaged. They show themselves to be an excellent festival band and just what the doctor ordered for the final night. Their songs may not speak for a generation in the way that early Arctic Monkeys tracks did, but they show with this performance they would have been a much more satisfying headline act.
Sunday Headliners – Kings Of Leon
The large gathering primed by Kaiser Chiefs are joined by thousands more before Kings Of Leon take to the stage, and the good vibes continue as the US band finally deliver the classic festival set that the crowd have been praying for since Friday.
With the news that Caleb Followill and his comrades were less than happy with an apparently un-enthusiastic crowd at Reading, there was never any danger of a similar response from the Leeds crowd, who were expertly warmed up by the Kaiser Chiefs and who were now ready for a headline appearance which would send them home happy.
Right from the opening strains of ‘Closer’, the crowd are immediately into it, and dancing and singing can be seen stretching back to all sides of the field. It’s obviously noted by frontman Caleb who, after witnessing a rapturous reception to ‘Crawl’, ‘Be Somebody’, ‘My Party’ and ‘Molly’s Chambers’ which follow, declares “five songs in and you’ve already blown Reading out of the water!” The cold response at Reading appears to have hit a nerve with Caleb, who seems to have taken the response as a visible indication of some criticism the band has received after the huge success of ‘Only By The Night’. Never usually the chattiest man on stage, he constantly interacts with the crowd between songs, clearly moved and reassured by the fantastic response his band are getting. He tells the crowd of how he always “writes songs with England in mind” and how he has “never written a song for fucking America”. It’s a reference to the accusations that ‘Only By The Night’ was delivered specifically to help them break into the US market which had so far eluded them. As the gig goes on, it’s obvious those insecurities which were heightened after Reading are being appeased by the response of the Leeds crowd, and the genuine love which he seems to show the Leeds crowd for alleviating those fears leads to almost sycophantic levels of adoration for the crowd. The two entities – band and crowd – have both had a frustrating weekend, and with each thriving off each other to rid those frustrations, the result is a truly spectacular gig. The band seem to determined to repay the crowd with the performance of their lives, and when an already hugely talented live act is spurned on as it is, it leads to a performance which instantly makes the weekend worthwhile.
(Kings of Leon performing their single at the Brit Awards 09)
Playing a set largely reliant on ‘Only By The Night’ and it’s immediate predecessor ‘Because Of The Times’, it never the less contains old favourites such as ‘Red Morning Light’, ‘Molly’s Chambers’ and ‘Four Kicks’ – Kings Of Leon are providing a set perfect for the occasion. Playing straight through with no encore, all boxes are ticked – earlier tracks to keep the more seasoned fans happy, and all the recent hits from Only By The Night to keep the more passive festival fans more than interested. Predictably ‘Sex On Fire’ gets an astonishing response, but when this is married with the already great response the rest of the set is getting, it still feels like only one of the cogs in the machine. When the final strains of ‘Black Thumbnail’ have died down, it’s clear the mass exodus’ of the previous two nights have not been played out, and the band members seems as reluctant to leave as the crowd.
Caleb tells the audience on more than one occasion that this will be their last UK gig for a while and he vows to be back better than ever. Well they can get on their plane knowing they have cemented their status as the world’s premier live act, and in doing so saved the 2009 Leeds Festival from the annals of obscurity. All hail the Kings.
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Mind-numbingly absurd comments on Radiohead. Festival crowds do what they want, so do decent bands. Radiohead could just play what you call ’90s hits’ and satisfy the likes of you and the undiscerning. Why don’t you curl up and wait for the tribute band? Radiohead are so far ahead of all the young pretenders as to make their appearance at Leeds something of an oddity, but so what? They challenge people to use their intelligence and actually listen for once. Credit to the organisers for putting them on, but no credit to those who merely want them to dive into every song of which the audience happen to know the title. I couldn’t care less if RH played a set of stuff no-one had ever heard before. They are master craftmen whose musicianship, technical ability, originalityand yes – ability to provide a festival audience with a stunning set (as they did) is a universe beyond even their nearest challengers.