Kings flip at the birds

Scott Kara.

Rock stars don't really need raincoats, since they are chauffeured almost everywhere they go. But the good old boys from Kings of Leon needed their anoraks this week when the pigeons who live in the rafters of a St Louis concert venue started pooping on them.

Bass player Jared Followill fared worst, with a spray of pigeon poo landing on his cheek and - supposedly - seeping into his mouth during third song of the night, Taper Jean Girl.

Yum. Yum. Although not exactly Fear Factor is it? Yet the band decided to call the concert off.

Their official statement said "health concerns" forced the band to cut the show short. Well, young Nathan wasn't too worried about health concerns when he was off shagging any taper-jean girl who moved following the band's star status in the wake of second album, Aha Shake Heartbreak, now, was he?

Now apart from the mighty kereru (aka the tubby New Zealand wood pigeon) I'm not a fan of these scuttling, scavenging birds.

But as a critic of live rock music myself, I have to take my hat off to the pigeons in this instance because I sometimes wish I had such a direct and effective way of critiquing a show, rather than having to fly the coop back to the office to file a review.

I'm not picking on the Kings.

I love the band, and have done ever since their hootin' and howlin' debut album, Youth and Young Manhood.

And I know for a fact they are - or at least used to be - hard men of rock'n'roll because during their set at the 2004 Big Day Out frontman Caleb Followill sauntered off stage as the band kept playing. A few minutes later he mosied back on, announced to the crowd he'd just had a barf, and kept playing.

So, in St Louis, I wish they'd ripped a few holes in a couple of plastic rubbish bags, thrown them on, hardened the hell up, and finished the show. And besides, getting dumped on by a bird is meant to bring good luck.

Birds - although not bird poo - have had a recurring role throughout music history, and the relationship, it seems, has been both a peaceful, and - mostly because of Ozzy Osbourne - a fraught one.

Ozzy once took a chunk out of a poor defenceless dove at a meeting with a record company in the early 80s (which is not to be confused with the time he bit the head off a bat).

Though this is one of those stories that has been clouded by the haze of rock'n'roll folklore, apparently he had meant to release the doves in a symbolic gesture of peace but must've got the munchies and decided to have a snack instead.

On the flipside, Jim Morrison's beautiful Bird of Prey - "flying high, take me on your flight" - is a win for the avian side.

And speaking of birds of prey, one wonders if singer-songwriter Sheryl Crow still thinks about taking a peck or two out of ex-fiance and cyclist Lance Armstrong every time she sees him in his lycra shorts on the TV.

Then there are the great bird band names, like Them Crooked Vultures, the Birds, the Eagles, and, of course, our own Mint Chicks, Muttonbirds, and Moana and the Moa Hunters.

And the album artwork of Opshop's latest album, Until the End of Time, is bird crazy too, with a crow on the cover, a dove on the back, and inside Jason Kerrison and the lads risking a Kings of Leon moment as they crouch down with a flock of doves taking off around them.

You'd best get your umbrellas ready fellas, because after the treatment their mate got from Ozzy, even doves have pride and this is what it sounds like when they seek a little revenge.