by Ray Waddell, Nashville |
February 06, 2009 3:19 EST
Kings Of Leon
Kings Of Leon will follow up their Jan. 29 sold-out performance at the Madison Square Garden in New York with another run of North American arena shows, beginning April 19 at Agganis Arena in Boston and wrapping at the Bill Graham Civic Center on May 21 in San Francisco.
The shows are in support of the band's new album "Only by the Night," which has sold nearly 400,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The album's debut single, "Sex on Fire," spent eight weeks atop Billboard's Modern Rock Airplay chart and is the band's biggest hit to date.
The Garden show marked the Kings first sell-out at the famed arena. "It was cool to see we had that many fans, especially considering we never really had a hit," Kings Of Leon's Nathan Followill tells Billboard. "It felt good to sell it out to a lot of people who were turned onto the band through 'Sex on Fire.'"
Followill says KOL consider themselves first and foremost a live band and don't record any song they can't pull off live. "There's nothing worse in the world than having a record you love and going to watch that band play and they've either got two guys on keyboards behind a curtain, they're playing to tracks, or they don't have that and the song sounds empty," he says.
"We've got a couple songs on this record that have keyboard parts, so our cousin Nacho is our stage manager, and we have him play keyboards on a couple of songs," he continues. "We make sure people can see him. We're not trying to be the Wizard of Oz."
Kings Of Leon are nominated for three Grammy Awards on Sunday: best rock album, best rock song, best rock performance by a duo or group with vocals. Followill says it would be nice to pick up an award or two, but "I've already got two Grammies; one lives in Oklahoma one lives in Tennessee. So we've already won
twice, even if we don't win."
Here are Kings Of Leon's tour dates:
April 19: Boston (Agganis Arena)
April 21: Toronto (Air Canada Centre)
April 22: Pittsburgh (Palumbo Centre)
April 24: Fairfax, Va. (Patriot Center)
April 25: Philadelphia (Spectrum)
April 27: Norfolk, Va. (Constant Convocation Centre @ ODU)
April 28: Raleigh (Koka Booth Amphitheatre)
April 30: Charlotte (Bojangles' Coliseum)
May 4: St. Augustine, Fla. (St. Augustine Amphitheatre)
May 5: Orlando, Fla. (UCF Arena)
May 7: Miami (Bank United Center)
May 8: Tampa, Fla. (Sundome)
May 10: Charleston, S.C. (North Charleston Coliseum)
May 12: Cincinnati (National City Pavilion)
May 13: Cleveland (Tower City)
May 19: Phoenix (Mesa Amphitheatre)
May 21: San Francisco (Bill Graham Civic Auditorium)
The shows are in support of the band's new album "Only by the Night," which has sold nearly 400,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The album's debut single, "Sex on Fire," spent eight weeks atop Billboard's Modern Rock Airplay chart and is the band's biggest hit to date.
The Garden show marked the Kings first sell-out at the famed arena. "It was cool to see we had that many fans, especially considering we never really had a hit," Kings Of Leon's Nathan Followill tells Billboard. "It felt good to sell it out to a lot of people who were turned onto the band through 'Sex on Fire.'"
Followill says KOL consider themselves first and foremost a live band and don't record any song they can't pull off live. "There's nothing worse in the world than having a record you love and going to watch that band play and they've either got two guys on keyboards behind a curtain, they're playing to tracks, or they don't have that and the song sounds empty," he says.
"We've got a couple songs on this record that have keyboard parts, so our cousin Nacho is our stage manager, and we have him play keyboards on a couple of songs," he continues. "We make sure people can see him. We're not trying to be the Wizard of Oz."
Kings Of Leon are nominated for three Grammy Awards on Sunday: best rock album, best rock song, best rock performance by a duo or group with vocals. Followill says it would be nice to pick up an award or two, but "I've already got two Grammies; one lives in Oklahoma one lives in Tennessee. So we've already won
twice, even if we don't win."
Here are Kings Of Leon's tour dates:
April 19: Boston (Agganis Arena)
April 21: Toronto (Air Canada Centre)
April 22: Pittsburgh (Palumbo Centre)
April 24: Fairfax, Va. (Patriot Center)
April 25: Philadelphia (Spectrum)
April 27: Norfolk, Va. (Constant Convocation Centre @ ODU)
April 28: Raleigh (Koka Booth Amphitheatre)
April 30: Charlotte (Bojangles' Coliseum)
May 4: St. Augustine, Fla. (St. Augustine Amphitheatre)
May 5: Orlando, Fla. (UCF Arena)
May 7: Miami (Bank United Center)
May 8: Tampa, Fla. (Sundome)
May 10: Charleston, S.C. (North Charleston Coliseum)
May 12: Cincinnati (National City Pavilion)
May 13: Cleveland (Tower City)
May 19: Phoenix (Mesa Amphitheatre)
May 21: San Francisco (Bill Graham Civic Auditorium)
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