The Kings of Leon: Rock 'n' roll's new monarchs

By EAMONN FITZGERALD

How did I increase my vocabulary this summer? I went to a rock concert in London. The language lesson began at the front door of the Hammersmith Apollo, where security personnel were carrying out "a full pat-down search," which meant an almost intimate physical check of all who wanted to get inside. Then, a dictionary moment for some of those who had just passed the security test: a big black sign with red letters read: "No moshing or crowd surfing." The best thing to do in situations like this is to talk to a music fan, and Cathy McGovern from Haringey had the answers. "Moshing," she explained, is a kind of aggressive dance in which people slam into each other, and "crowd surfing" happens when a fan is picked up and passed overhead from person to person around the arena during a concert.

There was no moshing or crowd surfing at the Hammersmith Apollo concert, just lots of "bottling." That's the word for what happens when the happy audience throws bottles of water at the band. The bottling was most intense when the group performed its summer hit "Fans," with its references to the "London scene" and "England's queen." Then came the chorus, sung by 3,000 voices:

And all the rainy days:
They ain't so bad when you're the king —
The king they want to be.

The kings the fans had come to see were The Kings of Leon.