This "Town" Just Got a Little Drearier

The album comes out tomorrow; a friend got me an early copy.

Growing up in the 80s in small town Iowa, I was surrounded by metal heads and corn. That was about it. Def Leppard fans, corn, Bon Jovi fans, corn, and corn. In short, it was all corn, in on sense or another…

My desperate circle of friends included deeply closeted homosexuals, Goth wannabes, and the occasional good girl longing for some style. And then one day, there entered this one “guitar god” who had recently moved from California and introduced us all to Depeche Mode and The Smiths. And then arrived a German exchange-student dominatrix who introduced us all to The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and Bauhaus. Me? I got to contribute a deep love of Crowded House, New Order, and the gloriously amazing Duran Duran.

Duran Duran - with their ridiculously fancy clothes and hair, their “man makeup”, and slick music - showed us there was more to the world than our particular brand of corn. God, I wanted to be on a sailboat, sipping fluorescent martinis, and being seduced by beautiful models only wearing body paint! Suddenly, the pig farms and Friday night football of southwestern Iowa lost a bit of its gossamer shine.

Our little group saved us all. It was vitally important that we separate ourselves from our beer-stealing Cro-Magnon classmates by stealing more expensive, harder liquor while daring to wear eyeliner and listening to fancy European bands. It took more courage than you could imagine. The local community college kids helped us out; they took us under their wings and made us the envy of the hair-band fans and their lame-ass “high school” parties.

For a long time after I moved on, the poor Midwestern kids didn’t have anything like this music to save them. Grunge, rap, and hip-hop killed any chance of fantasy, gloss, and glamour.

Then a couple years ago, into town blew The Killers, a band of young men from Las Vegas; men who wore eyeliner, tailored suits, and skinny ties! Their debut, Hot Fuss, became huge in the UK first (naturally). I saw them in the Orlando House of Blues when they were still barely known here. And then, boom! They somehow caught on, sold 5 million units, and were all over the radio!

It’s that surge in sales and popularity that I blame for the tragedy that happened next.

Sam’s Town. Even the album’s name suggests let-down.

Gone were the makeup and tailored suits. Now it’s all Credence Clearwater Revival haircuts and grubby facial hair. Much of the synthesizer was purged, and in its place came the crunchy, arena-style guitar. Duran Duran danced out of the picture, and Bruce Springsteen waltzed in.

Sam’s Town is a blatant play at injecting some Americana into the band’s image, thereby jettisoning any European slickness for down-home appeal.

Well, damn them!

The production is too fuzzy, the music is too bombastic, the wit is largely gone, and everything plays like it’s supposed to be a stadium sing-along for mullet-wearing, lite beer guzzlers. Apparently Lead screamer Brandon Flowers doesn’t know that his shaky-ish voice will sound tiny and weak in big venues like Madison Square Garden. The lyrics are all small town American poetry and rock cliché. I bet there will be nary a body-painted supermodel seen in any of their videos, nor a fancy sailboat.

Yes, I should loathe this crap!

But, damn, if these so-so songs ain’t catchy in that super-group sort of way! The synths are still there; they make a better contribution in the latter half of the album. (Incidentally, that’s by far the better half, too.) No, this ain’t Born to Run or even Rio. Sam’s Town (do they mean Sam Walton, the founder of that small town killer, Wal-Mart?) is almost a shy parody of The Boss and Duran Duran that you can accidentally take seriously if you really want to. I guess if the world really needs big venue, fuzzy and loud, mediocre pop rock pomposity, we could do much worse.

But boys? Killers? Listen, you know you took your band name from a New Order video. You may not have to wear the eyeliner. But please, just bathe, shave, and get dressed up again. There are still stylish kids in Iowa who desperately need your help!