Brandon Flowers releases a new solo album, Thrasher, in a couple of weeks’ time and the Killers frontman has been musing in a new interview about his future as an artist. And, specifically, whether he has one.
“My dad goes to yard sales, where he buys frames to take home and paint,” he revealed to The Times. “He’s never had any money in his life and he’s happier than I am.”
“I’m really going through it right now: how much longer do I want to do this, what does it mean, why am I doing it anyway? Whenever I finish a tour, without fail I get sick.
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“Then I think of Mick Jagger and ask myself: what keeps him getting up on that stage? I guess it’s because there are powerful moments in a concert. How could I not want to do that?”
Elsewhere in the interview, he drifts off in reverie at his ambitions before The Killers. “I aspired to be a valet,” he revealed. “I saw my cousins and uncles living off tips, supporting their entire families with those jobs, and my end goal was to work at a nice place like the Bellagio.
“My first job on the Strip was at Spago in Caesars Palace, bussing tables. I worked at a French brasserie, I worked at a golf course. I loved the service industry. I’m still in it, actually.”
Thrasher is the singer’s third solo album and sees him indulge his interest in country music. Recorded in Nashville, it features a number of esteemed names in that genre, including Gillian Welch collaborator David Rawlings and the 85-year-old harmonica player Charlie McCoy, who has graced recordings by Bob Dylan and Elvis.
He didn’t throw any light on any future plans for the Killers. It’s been five years now since the band’s last album, Pressure Machine. Since then the group have released two Stuart Price standalone singles in a synth pop style, though Flowers revealed soon after to The Times, again, that plans to record an entire album in that style had been abandoned.
“Halfway through recording I realised, ‘I can’t do this,’” Flowers said at the time: “This isn’t the kind of record… I think this will be the… I don’t think you’ll see us making this type of music any more.”
He added: “This is the crisis I’m in. The Killers are my identity and our songs fill the seats, but I’m more fulfilled making music like Pressure Machine.”
