Best of the Day: Brandon Flowers – August 3, 2015
Welcome to Best of the Day, our daily recommendation for what to check out around town. If you do one thing in Boston today, consider this.
Brandon Flowers photo by Thomas Hawk on Flickr
Chances are, if you were conscious during the early aughts, you have a distinct memory of the first time you heard The Killers’ “Somebody Told Me”—the mercilessly infectious dance-rock hit off their 2004 debut, Hot Fuss. In the follow-up, Sam’s Town, frontman/songwriter Brandon Flowers revealed his true desire: to become the Bruce Springsteen of Las Vegas. And he’s still traveling Thunder Road, if his latest work is any indication.
Earlier this year, Brandon Flowers wandered out of the Nevada desert bearing a polished platter of hook-laden, arena-ready blue-collar pop rock. Thanks to some slick production, The Desired Effect—Flowers’s second solo effort—comes as a glittering pyrotechnics display in comparison to the damp squib that was 2010’s Flamingo. The Desired Effect channels not only Springsteen, but also such ’80s icons as Duran Duran, Pet Shop Boys, and Peter Gabriel—so much so that it includes a song that samples Bronski Beat’s “Smalltown Boy” and features a spoken-word riff by Pet Shop Boys’ Neil Tennant. And, as Pitchfork put it, “Above these glossy textures, Flowers doubles down on his earnest goobery, which actually brings him closer to this ideal pop star image he’s been chasing.”
Tonight, Flowers comes to the House of Blues, where we may attempt to answer the eternal burning question: “Are we human, or are we dancer?”
August 3, 7 p.m., House of Blues Boston, 15 Lansdowne St., Boston, 888-693-2583, houseofblues.com/boston.
