Photo credit: Ryan Pfluger/Billboard
The Killers frontman Brandon Flowers discussed railing against the ‘fake modesty’ of some indie rockers in a new Creative Independent interview.
“I was definitely going against that fake modesty thing. I felt that really strongly when we were first starting. I didn’t understand it. I felt like I was seeing through the bullshit and the fake humility, and I wondered why other people weren’t seeing it. I mean, you got to have something to get up on the stage in front of people that is telling you, ‘You can do this,’ or that you are worth it. I can’t believe how many people buy it that those people on stage don’t feel like that. It was frustrating for me. I kind of kicked against it when we first came out.”
Flowers revealed in a recent Newsweek interview that for years he thought Brian Eno rejected producing Sam’s Town, but when he finally got a chance to ask the rock legend, he said it wasn’t true.
The Killers’ new track “Some Kind of Love,” offered a chance to meet a longtime hero, Brian Eno. The new song was written over an Eno instrumental, but his camp wouldn’t permit the Killers to release it on Wonderful Wonderful. “We tried to change the song,” says Flowers, “but we could never make it as good.” Shortly before the album was mastered, Flowers enlisted mutual friends to email and text Eno: “Just at least let me talk to him and explain it.” Finally, he got Eno on the phone, and permission was quickly secured.
Their conversation offered something else: the opportunity to clear up a perceived slight. Flowers was told that Eno had declined to produce the Killers’ second album, Sam’s Town. “For 11 years, every time I’ve gone on stage or put my pen to paper, I’ve carried with me that I’m not good enough for Brian Eno,” says Flowers. “So I said to him, ‘Were you asked to do Sam’s Town ?’ He said no. Who knows if it was some shady move from my record label or whatever, but that felt good.”
