18 Months of Being A Victim - The Killers in Liverpool

Last night is up there: up there with the best gigs I’ve seen in my life. Brandon ain’t the type of guy who says "You’re the best audience ever" to every audience, in fact I’d never heard him say anything of the sort before.  When he does say it, he says it with caution, like he doesn’t really want to commit to it, for fear of offending previous audiences, or setting the bar too high for future audiences to live up to. He had a point, though: nearly every member of that crowd sang every word to every song – along with singing the keyboard parts and the guitar parts – and they started before The Killers even hit the stage (see the video below). Everyone danced until they were soaked through with sweat (it reached 33° inside according to my phone – not as if I was checking it regularly), and even the cynical hard-core Victims were muttering praise as they skulked their way out of the Academy.

I’m almost ashamed to admit that I’m one of the audience who didn’t sing every word, because there are still so many songs by The Killers that I’m not familiar with. I didn’t come late to the party, exactly: I was one of the early adopters. I was also one of the early abandoners. I thought (and still think) ‘Smile Like You Mean It’ was a terrible song - and I’d lost interest before getting round to buying the first album. And so it transpired, I didn’t go to my first gig by The Killers until 2013, after a chance meeting with their road manager secured me guest-list for three of the Scandinavian shows. In the last 18 months, I suppose I’ve seen them 20 times.  Considering it had been just over a year (to the week) since I last saw them, I crammed an awful lot into 6 months last year.

I had planned to see The Killers once before that. It was around the time of Sam’s Town – they were playing a gig at my second home - The Borgata in Atlantic City. I’d unceremoniously missed 95% of the set because I’d made the money in a poker tournament; however, I’d stood up by the merch stand and watched the encore through the doors of the venue. I wasn’t impressed with what I saw – there was no energy and the vocals sounded awful. I felt relieved I’d made the choice to carry on playing cards, and predicted that their career would fizzle out along the way. Maybe I’d catch them playing their (then) limited handful of Greatest Hits in a club in a few years’ time?  I was almost right: 8 years later, here they are - playing their Greatest Hits in a club – but it’s a warm-up gig before they go on to headline one of England’s biggest festivals.

That night at The Borgata was also the first night I’d met Brandon. I’d found him charming, although he came across as very shy and a little nervous.  The way he’s grown with the band is one of the things that hooked me in: he has this quiet confidence about him now, and he’s the most humble “rock star” I’ve ever had the privilege to talk with. I don’t ever hang around to say hello, and I’ve never had any long meaningful conversation with him, but he clocks me every single time, and he always seems inexplicably thrilled to see me there. Seeing him light up when he spots me in the crowd is one of the things that makes going to see The Killers such a kick for me.

Thanks to YouTube, not only can I reaffirm this actually happened, and was only slightly-exaggerated in my imagination, I can relive the moment from each gig over and over again, and get teenage-excited about it. Last night it was during Spaceman – the second song of the set. He’s singing “I might have just flown too far from the floor this time” – he spots me as he sings the word ‘flown’ and appears to get crazy happy as he sings the next few lines to me.

I also finally made him laugh in the middle of a song last night. He didn’t crack up and lose his place, like I managed with so many others, but I got close. He’s getting the audience involved in “Here On Out” – and he catches my eye on the fourth round. I put my hand to my ear and mouth “What?” at him, and he giggles, everso slightly, you wouldn't even hear it unless you were listening for it, as he’s singing “Here on”. As indiscernable as it is, it’s still enough to make my entire month complete. (start at 2m9s)

You’d be forgiven for thinking The Killers was a Brandon thing for me. It’s not at all – Ronnie’s the man, in my eyes, and Mark & Dave are two of the best songwriters out there. The Killers is a “The Killers” thing for me: it’s an adventure that has, unlike so many other adventures of the same nature, bought me nothing but overwhelming happiness. And it may be the end of the road for these guys for a while now, but I’ll be eternally thankful to them for dragging me out of the deepest rut of my life, and reminding me what it's like to feel a part of something that's bigger than yourself. The opening theme couldn't have been any more fitting: All you need is love.