the Date: Tuesday, September 8, 2009
the Venue: Merriweather Post Pavilion (Columbia, MD)
(Photo credit to Zach Vitiello and his Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/people/zackvitiello/)
The Features opened, but we totally missed them … traffic getting into Merriweather is such a killer. I like the Features too … bummer.
Thankfully we didn’t miss any part of the main act, the Kings of Leon. These Tennessee boys, consisting of brothers Anthony Caleb Followill (vocals/guitar), Ivan Nathan Followill (drums) and Michael Jared Followill (bass), with their cousin Cameron Matthew Followill (guitar), rocked for two full hours. They focused a lot of this time on the most recent album, Only By the Night
. Even so, they played tunes from their whole catalog. This was an amazing show, one of my all time favorites. The whole show was fantastic, but for me, the best songs of the night were Taper Jean Girl, Fans, On Call, and Slow Night, So Long.Full Setlist: Closer / Crawl / Charmer / Taper Jean Girl / Molly’s Chambers / Red Morning Light / Fans / Revelry / The Bucket / My Party / Four Kicks / Sex on Fire / Notion / Manhattan / On Call / Cold Desert / Slow Night, So Long / ENCORE / Be Somebody / Knocked Up / Use Somebody / Black Thumbnail
“This is the most fun I’ve had at a show in a long time … that means we’re going to come back real soon.” (Caleb’s words to the crowd)
. The band put forth lots of energy, but there were only a handful of songs that I really enjoyed. I wouldn’t say a full-on disappointment, but I just didn’t walk away thinking, “Wow, I can’t wait until this band comes back to town.”
, Calexico’s most recent release, but they were sure to play many of the fan favorites. Of all the Calexico shows I’ve seen, this was the best. The rest of the crowd seemed to love the show too. There was plenty of dancing and the gritos were howled … Aaahhhuaaaayiiii! My personal highlights of the evening were Roka, Sunken Waltz, Two Silver Trees, El Gatillo (Trigger Revisited), Alone Again Or, and the final song of the evening, Guero Canelo.
. My favorites of the evening included What’s in It for Me?, Wake Up, Louisiana, The Rat, Little House of Savages, Long Time Ahead of Us, and In the New Year (where Hamilton's voice crescendoed into a scream in the chorus). It was just an amazing performance from a band that I love. We even had a surprise guest appearance from Peter’s little boy. Awwwww.
. Many of the night’s tunes came from that album. I mean, they played nearly that entire album. Thankfully, they played tons of other songs too including some of my favorites, Off the Record, Anytime, Golden, Gideon, Lay Low and, of course, One Big Holiday. It’s also worth noting that they played Cobra, a rare tune off of the band’s 
EP … that’s like a 20 minute song!
compilation CD. One of the other bands on the CD was the Black Angels. I must have listened to Black Grease a million times. We’ve seen them a few times before, including under the blazing sun at Lollapalooza 2006 and down in Austin at a small club during the Austin City Limits Festival 2006 (Austin is where they’re from by the way). Needless to say, we love ‘em!
. My favorites were Black Grease (of course), Manipulation, Doves, and The Sniper at the Gates of Heaven. I’m sure the rest of the crowd left the club as I did, with ringing ears and a grin on my face. Thank you, Black Angels … thank you.
