{"id":10032124,"date":"2022-10-04T10:41:55","date_gmt":"2022-10-04T14:41:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vanyaland.com\/?p=10032124"},"modified":"2022-10-05T16:07:04","modified_gmt":"2022-10-05T20:07:04","slug":"live-review-the-killers-surprise-with-sawdust-and-the-smiths-at-td-garden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vanyaland.com\/2022\/10\/04\/live-review-the-killers-surprise-with-sawdust-and-the-smiths-at-td-garden\/","title":{"rendered":"Live Review: The Killers surprise with ‘Sawdust’ and The Smiths at TD Garden"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Oh, to pick a clever song reference that can encapsulate Monday night\u2019s (October 3) encore at The Killers<\/a><\/strong> concert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJohnny Was A Friend of Mine?\u201d \u201cUncle Jo[h]nny?\u201d No matter how you frame it, The Killers gave fans at TD Garden something they\u2019ve never seen before: Johnny Marr shredding to a \u201cMr. Brightside\u201d remix from Sawdust<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After nearly 20 years of slinging the finest rock from Sin City, there\u2019s not many surprises that Killers frontman Brandon Flowers can sneak under the his sports coat sleeve. Inviting opener and Smiths favorite — we\u2019ve collectively downvoted Morrissey as a society, correct? — Johnny Marr to trade hits and close out the show felt like the obvious choice to up the encore’s “wow” factor. Especially when it came time to show The Smiths\u2019 catalog some love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI still love you \/ Only slightly, only slightly less \/ Than I used to,\u201d Flowers recited on the chorus of \u201cStop Me If You Think You\u2019ve Heard This One Before.\u201d The relevance of the candid line likely soared right over the band\u2019s head, like the borderline-excessive explosions of confetti that punctuated their set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s tough to keep up with The Killers these days, or at least want<\/em> to keep up with them. The farther the band strays from the perfection of Hot Fuss<\/em>, the more it\u2019s clear that they debuted with their magnum opus — a \u201conce in a lifetime\u201d<\/a> project, if you will. Which is a fantastic feat on paper, but also means that it\u2019s all downhill from here, even if the fall is gradual and the starting point is the upper echelon of decade-defining rock. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As it turns out, Sam\u2019s Town<\/em> wasn\u2019t the album to whine about. That distinction fluctuates between 2017\u2019s Wonderful Wonderful<\/em> and the band’s newest effort Pressure Machine<\/em>, which failed to squeeze out any diamonds and instead plays like Americana tropes drawn out to last 11 songs. Record sales suggest fans didn\u2019t exactly rush to buy a copy<\/a>, yet they\u2019re still forking over cash to hear those sweet sounds of the mid-2000s, from \u201cAll These Things I\u2019ve Done\u201d to \u201cWhen You Were Young.\u201d They\u2019ll even rearrange the Garden’s court-side seating with the tremors of their stomps if the pulse of a Hot Fuss<\/em> track wordlessly commands them to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019d tell you how many fists flew into the air for direct hits like \u201cSomebody Told Me,\u201d but y\u2019know. The scene isn’t all different from their 2018 rendition (also at the Garden<\/a>), or the one that followed at Boston Calling<\/a> later that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is a super-spreader event,\u201d Flowers proclaimed with a slightly tone-deaf amount of confidence. \u201cWe\u2019re spreading peace, we\u2019re spreading love, and we\u2019re spreading rock and roll.\u201d Oh, and a little folk rock, too, which seemed to stump even the most devoted fans. Flowers might not have an answer to his existential cry of \u201care we human, or are we dancer?\u201d but if he\u2019s playing new songs \u201cRunaway Horses\u201d or \u201cCody,\u201d the answer is not<\/em> the latter. The exuberant crowd came to a standstill \u2014 twice \u2014 when The Killers tried to slay a few tracks from Pressure Machine<\/em>, with nary a soul singing along in sight. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It kind of makes you wonder if it\u2019s even worth it to pull from any album post-Day & Age<\/em>. Right up until they blasted a new little tune called \u201cboy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hot on the heels of a deluxe edition of Pressure Machine<\/em>, The Killers recently dropped an unassuming single that plunges into the synth rock that made them worth fussing over in 2004. As a mid-set reset, \u201cboy\u201d struck the group\u2019s sound right at its moody, upbeat core, side-stepping that foray into folk that felt so out of left field. Even if a random scenario generator never dreamt up the Smiths-Sawdust<\/em> situation, “boy” presented its own subtle shock to the crowd: It was an undeniable return to form. (Finally<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bring a Killers fan to a concert and they’ll sprint to the soothing embrace of early-aughts nostalgia. Show them a sliver of Hot Fuss<\/em>‘ sound is still out there, whirring in the band’s creative headspace, and they’ll do you one better. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They’ll smile like they mean it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oh, to pick a clever song reference that can encapsulate Monday night\u2019s (October 3) encore at The Killers concert. \u201cJohnny Was A Friend of Mine?\u201d \u201cUncle Jo[h]nny?\u201d No matter how you frame it, The Killers gave fans at TD Garden something they\u2019ve never seen before: Johnny Marr shredding to a \u201cMr. Brightside\u201d remix from Sawdust. After nearly 20 years of slinging the finest rock from Sin City, there\u2019s not many surprises that Killers frontman Brandon Flowers can sneak under the his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4108,"featured_media":10032136,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,91],"tags":[927,30372,530,2041],"class_list":["post-10032124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","category-reviews","tag-live-review","tag-pressure-machine","tag-td-garden","tag-the-killers"],"yoast_head":"\nLive Review: The Killers surprise with 'Sawdust' and The Smiths at TD Garden<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Boston show proved that Killers fans can 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