Album Review

If you’re looking for subtlety and nuance, you best keep right on moving. But if you’re looking for a band to go for broke on every single recording, bombard with you hooks until you beg for mercy, and deliver lyrics that reach for Springsteen’s romance and Bowie’s surrealism but end up closer to Jim Steinman’s bombast (yes, that would be the Meat Loaf guy), then Day & Age, the third album from Vegas products The Killers, should be right up your alley.

Lest you think I’m here to bury The Killers instead of praising them, I have to say that Day & Age is almost as exhilarating as it is exhausting. Working with producer Stuart Price, who recently gave a little pop sheen to fellow heart-on-their-sleevers Keane, the band piles flourish on top of flourish and never mails in a song. There’s truly something to be said for that in this cynical age, and I found myself, after each song on the album, both shaking my head in disbelief at their brazenness yet still eager to see what else they had in their bag of tricks in the songs to come.

The Killers are basically lead singer Brandon Flowers and three guys who try not to get buried alive by all the excess. In fairness, drummer Ronnie Vannucci Jr. gets to flaunt some exotic percussion now and again on songs like “Joy Ride” and “I Can’t Stay,” and bassist Mark Stoermer often gets to lay down a line or two before getting out of the way of the swelling choruses. Lead guitarist Dave Keuning gets a perfunctory solo on the opening track “Losing Touch,” but, aside from that, basically joins the other two in locking into the New Wave groove that’s at the heart of most of the up-tempo numbers.

For as big as his group is, Flowers really missed out on the 80’s, when his favored attack of lush, if familiar, melodies and unapologetically grandiose lyrics would have made him an MTV staple. What the last two albums have lacked though, and what made the debut, Hot Fuss, such a revelation are the real-world details and sly sense of humor that Flowers slipped into irresistible pop singles like “Somebody Told Me” and “Mr. Brightside.”

On Day & Age, it’s all about the drama, which is clear from the first single “Human,” which finds Flowers on “the platform of surrender” and “on my knees, looking for the answer.” It’s reminiscent of overwrought yet engaging late-period Abba hits like “The Winner Takes It All” or “When All Is Said And Done.” I doubt that’s what he was going for, but there’s nothing wrong with it in small doses.

“Spaceman” and its tale of alien abduction reaches for Bowie profundity but comes closer to the cheesy 80’s knockoff “Major Tom Comes Home,” and yet it’s still a thrillingly bumpy ride. Indeed saving the world and/or saving souls seems to be Flowers’ mission in many of these songs. At times you just want him to relax and enjoy the malaise he seems to be endlessly describing.

The ballads illustrate the dichotomy of this album well. As you listen to “A Dustland Fairytale,” with its embarrassingly clichéd Bruce-isms like “slick chrome American prince,” you want to laugh, but then the dramatic chorus kicks in and you’re right in the middle of the story with Flowers, hoping his “Cinderella” heroine makes it through OK. “Good Night, Travel Well” spends most of its 6-plus minutes as a dirge, and check out this whopper of an opening stanza:

The unknown distance to the great beyond
Stares back at my grieving frame
To cast my shadow by the holy sun
My spirit moans with a sacred pain

Yowsa! But just when it seems to time to abandon ship, the refrain comes on and the chords switch into majestic mode for a truly chill-inducing moment. Such moments wouldn’t be possible if it weren’t for Flowers insistence on trying to write the song to end all songs each time out of the box. It may be a foolhardy mission, but it can be fun to hear him try.

No Comments »