In Bloom

Brandon Flowers' Flamingo

by J. Edward Keyes

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Published: Oct 13, 2010

Brandon Flowers Flamingo (Island)

Of all of Brandon Flowers' gifts — and there are many — the best, by far, is his fearlessness. That bald audacity emerged over time: The B. Flowers that piloted Hot Fuss was still something of a nervous New Waver. It wasn't until Sam's Town that he started learning how to puff out his chest, lunging again and again for the Epic Statement, modesty be damned. That full-bodied gusto caused a lot of critics — including this one — to wrongly consider that album a failure, when in actuality it was a harbinger, the first appearance of Brandon the Bold, swelling up and staring down 40-plus years of rock tropes. What's so relentlessly winning about Flowers is that he's got the guts to go for it. Looking around at a commercial rock field that seems cleanly split between post-grunge groaners and pasty crooners, it's hard not to invoke Jack Nicholson's speech near the end of A Few Good Men when thinking of Flowers: Deep down, in places we don't like to talk about at parties, we want him on that wall — we need him on that wall.

And so in the first song of the very good Flamingo, Flowers' first — and, as good as it is, hopefully last — effort without his band, he warns us, "Welcome to fabulous Las Vegas/ Didn't nobody tell you, the house will always win?" Flamingo is a record about lucklessness, and in it our boy is either traveling miles of dusty road ("Magdalena"), or lying face-down on the floor (er, "On the Floor") or getting dumped by a woman who's awesomely named Valentino ("Was It Something I Said?"). And fortunately for all of us, he does it all while dangling from gargantuan melodic hooks, and with religious conviction. Because, at the end of the day, it isn't about Flowers' megalomania or any quest for personal advancement — he does it because he truly believes in rock 'n' roll. He does it because he wants there to be epic, generation-defining records like the ones he had growing up — full of enormous choruses and Grand Statements about Love and God and Hurt, and if he has to make those records himself, goddammit, that's exactly what he's going to do.

(j_keyes@citypaper.net)

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