Summer tour season is well under way here in Queensland, and this week we had The Killers ‘Rebel Diamonds’ Greatest Hits tour roll into town, performing on a hot and humid Monday night at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre. Monday night concerts have a different feel. Always a risky proposition for a lot of artists, but this orderly and polite sold-out crowd of 13,500 make their way through the car park to queue up excitedly at the gates, mostly skipping that second drink at the outside bar to head into the air conditioning.
At precisely 8pm ‘Radio Free Alice’ from Melbourne walk purposely onto the large stage. Looking like a private school boy band with sensible haircuts and monochromatic uniforms, and sounding like they raided their parents Joy Division vinyl collection; they launch into an urgent and confident set. The band make an interesting choice as a support act for The Killers, who have never hidden their love of the early British post-punk scene. Maybe they see something of their younger selves in Radio Free Alice, and want to give them the exposure they deserve.
The support finishes, and a 40ft curtain shrouds the stage, with ‘Boys and Girls’ by Blur getting the crowd moving forward, patiently waiting to witness what these Las Vegas showmen have in store for us tonight. Right on 9pm the lights go down and the curtain is pulled to reveal the iconic Las Vegas neon sign homage ‘K’ synth stand, revealing Brandon Flowers behind, bathed in light and virtually floating from side to side across the wide stage. Dressed in Cuban heels and a diamante encrusted pinstripe suit and satin shirt, he seems larger than life, with perfect teeth and an Elvis inspired quiff, the front man really is a true performer in the classic show business sense. Every move choregraphed perfectly and ready to be beamed onto the floor to ceiling height LED screens behind the stage.
‘Read My Mind’ from Sam’s Town gets the show on the road, building perfectly into a huge audience wide singalong, reminding us what a quality album that was, with a fresh direction in song writing craft at the time giving the band a whole new aesthetic and sound. To keep things building, the iconic intro guitar and synth stabs of ‘Somebody Told Me’ from the much loved debut Hot Fuss literally storm off the stage and right through us. Maybe it’s because it’s a Monday night, maybe it’s because I’ve seen a lot of live music lately, but it has to be said that this show is loud. Ronnie Vannucci Jr is key to The Killers sound and a driving force behind these songs, but the kick drum thumps so deep and low it’s almost taking away from the rest of the mix in my opinion.
Red and blue lasers shoot from the front of stage right across the stadium, connecting the band with the very back row way up in the stalls. The combination of stunning visuals and panning cameras giving us all a front row seat to the polished 7-piece band, ably supporting the two remaining original members, Flowers and Vannucci Jr. This current line-up is the same as The Killers 2022 tour, and a quick scan back through my photos from the last tour (almost exactly two years earlier) reveals the similarity between that show, and this. Stage positions are the same, the set is virtually the same, and even the wardrobe of each member is almost the same. It’s a fact that I can’t escape as I wonder why a band so concerned with its own image hasn’t reinvented itself visually in the last two years.
‘Spaceman’, ‘Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine’ and ‘Smile Like You Mean It’ deliver hit after hit and Brandon has the crowd hanging on his every word and move. And then something changes. A handful of mid-tempo, lesser known songs from Rebel Diamonds are performed with a sense of low energy, with one song stopped while security attend to a young girl who appears to have fainted. Kudos to Brandon and the band for putting her safety first. After the inevitable mid-set bar and bathroom breaks start, the energy picks up again when the front man delivers a TV Church Evangelist styled intro to ‘The Man’. It works, but lyrics like “Let me hear you praise the man” can’t help but remind me of Brandon’s unashamed Mormon based faith, and makes me focus on clues, some not so subtly, proclaiming his beliefs and devotion, peppered throughout the lyrics. Tonight, it seems more pronounced than I had noticed before.
The set carries on with the pace picking up, even despite another song being stopped while a dude in a Roxy Music t-shirt is ejected from the front of the stage, lifted over the barrier by an otherwise unphased security team. Brandon asks us “would Bryan Ferry approve of this?”, and once again energy is lost, but soon builds again with solid hits like ‘Runaways’, ‘All These Things That I’ve Done’ and ‘When You Were Young’ getting punched out with great force. The set closes with a cover of ‘Don’t Change’ by INXS, which is perfectly fine, but a stark reminder of just how good Michael Hutchence was as both front man and lead vocalist. The Killers version has a slight pub rock vibe to it if I’m honest, and even Brandon’s voice doesn’t seem to quite reach the emotion and unique delivery of the original.
After a quick break, the band re-enter the stage and the encore gets under way. ‘Your Side Of Town’, ‘Boy’, and ‘Human’ lean into the more electronic side of The Killers, giving us a club feel as we build toward the one we’re all waiting for – ‘Mr Brightside’. It’s such a great pop song, a true classic and it gets everyone out of their seats and singing (or shouting) along. And of course, it’s delivered flawlessly with huge fanfare, lights, visuals and a booming sound leaping off stage and filling every corner of the venue. And just like that, it’s over and we make our way for the doors and the dreaded Brisbane Entertainment Centre car park exit cluster. The crowd is buzzing, clearly The Killers killed it, but I can’t help but be left with a sense of déjà vu from 2022 – and wonder what version of Las Vegas’s favourite sons we will see next time.
Chris Searles, for The Rockpit.
