Gig review: Kings Of Leon, Glasgow

“We’re playing a rock ‘n’ roll show tonight,” insisted singer Caleb Followill near the end of the set, “and if you don’t mind we’re gonna play one more.”

The band has plenty of good songs, all of which will probably always be second to Use Somebody and Sex On Fire. Picture: Getty Images

Kings Of Leon - Bellahouston Park, Glasgow

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He needn’t have apologised for the additional loud track, because what a Kings of Leon set demands is yet more feisty 
bar-room rockers. Their tendency lately is to stray too close to winsome, sand-blown country epics and fill out their recently arena-sized sets with them.

This first of the new Summer Sessions series on Bellahouston Park was a real success though, a compact event in a naturally sloping amphitheatre with a surprising degree of accessibility from the city, considering it wasn’t on the central Glasgow Green.

The headliners were supported by locals Admiral Fallow and indie-rockers the Courteeners, lending a midweek mini-festival atmosphere, and the Kings were a suitably populist choice to kick these gigs off. The atmosphere was easy-going but lively, and for the most part they’ve got a bunch of stirring anthems in their repertoire that everyone likes.

All of which made for a good show, which offered as many opportunities to go to the bar as it did to join in communal harmony with the crowd.

The quartet of siblings (and one cousin) have decent songs, including the upbeat country holler of Back Down South and the hard-to-resist melodies of Fans, and they have lesser hits like the space-filling thrum of Pyro, but judging by the audience reaction, whatever else they do – including Supersoaker and other tracks from the forthcoming album Mechanical Bull – will forever play second fiddle to the eternally euphoric Use Somebody and Sex On Fire.