CD Review: The Killers - Sawdust

This album was released as a type of B-sides, rarities and remixes collection. As in my Eels posting in June, you will know that I can be quite partial to this type of release, if, of course, the band has the depth to support it. The Killers as such can be considered a fairly new band. Formed in 2002, and with only two albums to their name before releasing ‘Sawdust’ I think its safe to call them a young band. Bands like the Eels, Pixies and others had a lot of ‘real’ albums out before their B-sides releases surfaced, so I was a bit suspicious about this release at first – how can they sustain a full length (17 song strong) release of this nature?

 

First I must mention that my motivation for buying it was two-fold. One, I am a huge Lou Reed fan, bordering on the completist in his case. Reed is in fact the only artist that brings out the completist tendencies in me, I have however balked at buying ‘Metal Machine Music’ so I suppose I am not a real completist. Nevertheless his appearance on the first track of ‘Sawdust’, on a song called ‘Tranquilize’ was reason enough for me to buy the album. The second reason was that it was going for a slashed price in my local Musica store. Was I disappointed? No way and here’s why.

 

‘Tranquilize’ is an awesome song. Lou Reed is brilliant and his and Brandon’s voices work extremely well together. Another stand-out track for me, which may bother purists, but which I put down to pure fun is the Jacques Lu Cont’s remix of ‘Mr. Brightside’. Why mess with perfection you might ask – my answer is that when it’s done this tastefully, let’s have a little fun and enjoy the moment. Another interesting, and for me, thoroughly enjoyable track, is the Dire Straits cover ‘Romeo and Juliet’. A lot can be said about the paucity of the 1980’s era popular music offerings.  But when one examines the key influences on a band like The Killers and hears how they have managed to distil, and make their own, certain key moments of that era (think Soft Cell and A Flock of Seagulls, these leap out at me when I listen to ‘Sawdust’), you realise that it was not all bad. Here though the take on ‘Romeo and Juliet’ is pretty straight forward but rather enjoyable.

 

Another cover on this album is that of Joy Division’s ‘Shadowplay’. The pitch of Brandon’s voice was never going to match that of Ian Curtis, and it is refreshing to hear that he does it ‘his way’. Hopefully this cover will turn a younger generation onto the brilliance of Joy Division.

 

Then there is another cover, a few more original songs, and, to me, not a single bum track. I particularly like ‘Leave the Bourbon on the shelf’ with the world weary line ‘Leave the Bourbon on the shelf and I’ll drink it by myself’. Excellent rhyming, and in my view up there with the originality of Hank Williams. Apparently this song is the first part of a Murder Trilogy. You can find the details on Wikipedia.

 

This album is well worth purchasing, you will not be disappointed, it is definitely a hidden treasure.