Kings of Leon: Can We Please Have Fun review – polished but tired

Can We Please Have Fun is such a horrible phrase. It adheres to the Nashville rockers’ favoured five-syllable album title structure, if that’s important to you, but is prickly and passive-aggressive coming from four middle-aged men. Its intended message feels like inane boosterism given the state of the world; further proof of the quartet’s unending insularity. And why should rock be fun anyway? Kings of Leon’s best songs – Knocked Up, Milk, Closer – are shadowed by death or loss.

The good news is that Caleb Followill retains one of the great rock voices, a yearning, brittle, whiskey-brined caw that’s richer than ever. Kid Harpoon’s production is invariably excellent. Actual Daydream finds unlikely concord between coastal post-punk and heartland MOR; Nothing to Do is a wrecking ball of pent-up aggression; and the guitars on Mustang are electrifying shards of sound propelling the song’s racked, feral hunger.

Sadly, nearly every lyric dissolves into garbled nonsense. This just about works for Ballerina Radio’s sketch of post-apocalyptic dystopia, but mostly evidences the familiar problems of a band 25 years into their career: at the peak of their playing power, yet blighted by a vastly diminished ability to write strong songs.