How I wish The Killers lived at Albert Hall, because then it’d be a great deal easier to find and kill them. Seriously. The Killers are the most inappropriately named band in the living, breathing pantheon of turgid pop / rock history since ’60s combo Philip and Evereth’s Dulcimer Orchestra released the album ‘Phile’. Nevertheless, so many Mormon-loving admirers have flocked to bask in the band’s euphonic guitar maladies that the quartet has gone super-global. So revered are they, that there is now a graffiti image of the band within the esteemed corridors of the Albert Hall alongside other artists that played there: artists that include The Who, The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles.
I personally pity Killers fans, but they can now at least stay out of my way with their very own live DVD to keep them glued to their screens, and there’s even a copy of the band’s very first live CD of the same show all bound together in one bondage-inducing digipack. That should keep them bopping piously around their marble-flecked patios! Oops, sorry. Sorry that you are fans of The ‘Killers’, for they are a band that sound more like pillows – pillows with strings. The Pillows. That’s a more appropriate moniker. Brandon?
But now, here we are – ready for a show lasting just under two hours packed with some 24 tracks. As if that wasn’t torturously fulfilling enough for the most ardent Killette, there are even BONUS festival performances from Oxegen, Hyde Park and the V Festival. Yes, iconic ‘aint they? Spanning their young five years in the spotlight, the DVD is beautifully captured by director Dick Carruthers and producer Jim Parsons with stunning colour rendering that also flicks ‘artfully’ into black and white. Wonderfully complemented with the inclusion of both Dolby 2.0 and 5.1 surround soundtracks it’s perhaps the inclusion of this technology that marks the DVD in superiority to the CD, which generally suffers from unsatisfactory audio in comparison. For example, the distorted guitars of anthem ‘Somebody Told Me’ packs punch on the DVD, but is nothing but a tired drone on CD.
Nevertheless, The Killers’ ridiculously catchy melodies are driven by a determined performance by the band, particularly frontman Brandon Flowers who, quite naturally, plays excessively to the audience to make for good representation on camera. Material from 2007 compilation, Sawdust, comes in the form of ‘fan favourite’ ‘Sweet Talk’ along with their cover of Joy Division’s ‘Shadowplay’ (from the 1979 ‘Unknown Pleasures’ album – a title I could relate to whilst watching this performance).
Taking their cue from classic British synth-pop, this atrocious American band sap the grit and soul from influences, replacing it with tawdry Las Vegas fakery. Even the set is a neon set of tat: all plastic palm trees, digital skies and glowing chaos.
Still, we must respect the public demand, and the public wants what the public gets – but I don’t get what this society wants. Therein, lies a very real and tragic reality.
