The once-prominent concept of the “groupie” is old hat. Bands and artists used to revel in the idea of their biggest fans following them around from city to city, but today’s media-saturated, globally connected listening public makes it too easy to run into viral trouble through everyday fan interaction. The idealist middle ground between inescapable obsession and friendly sincerity doesn’t have to be a fantasy according to The Kooks. “She Moves In Her Own Way” offers the modern and quintessentially genuine example of fandom that every band yearns for by removing the need for irresistible content worship and replacing it with honest friendship. As simple as it sounds, a friend is better than a follower.

Evident shades of the 1960’s British invasion course through The Kooks vintage veins with every thickly pronounced lyric. Both in look and sound, The Kooks quadruple-platinum debut album Inside In / Inside Out reflects palpable Beatles influences from the legends’ earliest works of art like Please Please Me and With The Beatles. Both British sensations transform lively classic rock by putting an optimistically light, happy-go-lucky spin on a hardened genre and turning it into a widely acceptable piece of pseudo-pop. The Kooks’ lovably thick cadence and smiley positivity testifies to their confidence, as the classically guided crew even classifies themselves as a pop group despite intrinsically sounding like a an alternative band. Their personal categorization and fan-centric attitude (you can’t be a pop group with devoting yourself to public desires) is exactly what gets their fans to “Come to my show just to hear about my day.” That level of connection isn’t luck, it’s empathy in its purest form.