The Killers - Wonderful Wonderful - Review

On June 14th The Killers announced their new album, and debuted a new song. It has been five long years since their last full length album "Battle Born" was out, and thirteen years since "Hot Fuss" took the world by storm. The lengthy delay can be attributed to members of The Killers maybe growing up a bit, or not exactly being akin to the rock star lifestyle. They made time to hit the studio, but are not really interested in touring.

The Killers themselves have had a strange past. They soared to the top with "Hot Fuss" and everyone was singing along to tracks like "Somebody Told Me", and "Smile Like You Mean It." Brandon Flowers after became pretty cocky making all sorts of claims. It wasn't that he was wrong, and most people would agree that The Killers were one of the best of their generation, but it became easier to criticize their work, that might not have had as wide of an appeal.

That brings us to this album which starts out pretty great. It has a mixture of sounds from "Sams Town" and "Day and Age", but the changes mostly show how much the band has grown. They don't rely on synths to carry the melody as much, but instead use them to enhance the sounds of a piano or guitar riff. The sound of the album certainly feels like a Killers record, and yet stands on its own. The Killers never really had a problem of creating new sounds, and this album is no different.

The Killers have been able to take in a lot of the influences that they have from the past, but mix it with a sort of blemish between their own sounds, and something new. It is almost hard to pin point exactly what it is, but it's a confident rock and roll sound. Nothing screams this more than "Run For Cover" which is one of the released singles, a fun, bold and catchy tune. It highlights what this album is at it's best, and also helps older fans still feel like they know this band.

The album sort of sways back and forth from slower to more upbeat melodies, and never really leaves the listener feeling bored. It does really well with the tempo, and kept me listening throughout. I think this would be a great album to kind of just hang out, and have playing in the background of some backyard barbecue, and maybe that's what The Killers are now. They are tame rock, or adult rock, or some form of more boring easy to predict rock. That might be true.

There isn't anything really surprising about this record. The tunes are catchy, the ballads are well written. Brandon pens the lyrics slightly different stylistically, but nothing so out of the ordinary that you wouldn't recognize it. The songs are good. Everything you would expect from a Killers album, but at the end of the day you're still going to be missing Hot Fuss.