The Killers
Brandon Flowers the youngest of six children, was born on June 21, 1981, in the Las Vegas suburb of Henderson, Nevada. Flowers’s family lived in Henderson until Flowers was eight, when they moved to Payson, Utah, for two years before moving to Nephi, Utah.
In 2001, Brandon Flowers was fired by his first band, a synth-pop trio known as Blush Response.
Dave Keuning placed an ad in the local Las Vegas Weekly looking to form a band, mentioning Oasis as one of his influences. Brandon Flowers, who shared Keuning’s love of groups such as Oasis, (Flowers attended an Oasis concert at the Hard Rock Hotel in 2002, on the band’s Tour of Brotherly Love), New Order and the Cure, answered it, only to have Keuning promptly hand him a TASCAM-recorded four-track demo of “Mr. Brightside”.
While playing guitar with the Negative Ponies Mark Stoermer met Brandon Flowers and Dave Keuning, who were performing as an early incarnation of the Killers. He was a fan of the band’s unique sound and was often present at the band’s gigs.
Drummer Ronnie Vannucci had played for several local bands, including ska-punk group Attaboy Skip, who enjoyed regional success in the mid-1990s and Free Food, a cover band who played at prisons and homeless shelters in the Las Vegas area.
They named the band the Killers after a fictional band in the music video for the New Order song “Crystal”. In the video for their 2001 single Crystal, New Order were replaced by a group of attractive teenagers, who were supposed to be members of the fictional band “The Killers”.
The Killers became residents of Vegas transvestite bar Sasha’s, playing Sunday after Sunday to a curious crowd.
Dave Keuning once worked at the Banana Republic store in The Venetian Hotel and Casino on The Strip.
Lyrically, “Mr. Brightside” depicts a true story of Flowers’ jealousy and paranoia when he walked into a bar in Las Vegas and found his girlfriend cheating on him. “I was asleep and I knew something was wrong,” he said. “I have these instincts. I went to the Crown and Anchor, a bar in Vegas, and my girlfriend was there with another guy.”
In their first performance together as the Killers, Keuning and Flowers played their first live show together at an open mic night at the Cafe Espresso Roma in Las Vegas in January 2002.
The Killers would sneak into the music practice halls of University of Nevada, Las Vegas – which is where they wrote and practised the majority of the tracks that appear on their 2004 debut album Hot Fuss.
While walking through a Virgin Megastore in Las Vegas in 2002, Flowers noticed the album artwork on the then-new Elvis Presley compilation album ELV1S: 30 No. 1 Hits. This gave him the inspiration to use a marquee sign motif as the band’s logo.
In the United Kingdom, “Mr. Brightside” is the 3rd biggest selling/streaming song of all time and is the longest-charting single on the UK Official Singles Chart Top 100, having spent over 408 weeks (nearly seven and a half years) on the chart as of 2024.
“Mr. Brightside” was named “Song of the Decade” by UK radio stations Absolute Radio and XFM, and in April 2010 Last.fm revealed that it was the most-listened-to track since the launch of the online music service, with the track being played over 7.66 million times. According to the Official Charts Company, the song has been streamed 281 million times in the UK and has sold 3,520,000 copies there as of April 2021.
Brandon once used a Ouija board and developed a fear of the number 621, which relates to his birthday, June 21. He remains convinced he is going to die on that day.
Their 2004 album Hot Fuss reached number seven on the Billboard 200 and number one on the UK Albums Chart. As of December 2012, Hot Fuss had sold more than seven million copies worldwide, including more than three million in the United States and more than two million in the United Kingdom. It went on to spend more weeks on the UK Albums chart than any other album that decade, 173 weeks in total.
Flowers married Tana Mundkowsky in 2005 and lives in Las Vegas, Nevada, and Park City, Utah.
Before he was in the band, bassist Mark Stoermer had a job as a medical courier – delivering body parts for transplant surgery.
The Killers were named the World’s Best Selling New Group at the 2005 World Music Awards. The same year they won the MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist and were also nominated for three Grammy Awards with Hot Fuss being nominated for Best Rock Album. In the UK, they picked up an NME Award for Best International Band. The band was recognized by Rolling Stone as the “best-selling new rock band of the past year” in June 2005.
American music engineer, mixer and producer Mark Needham who engineered Hot Fuss has worked with many prominent names in music, including: Fleetwood Mac, Imagine Dragons, Chris Isaak, John Hiatt, P!nk, Dolly Parton, Elton John and Stevie Nicks.
The band’s second album takes its name from Sam’s Town Hotel and Gambling Hall, a hotel and casino in Las Vegas. Sam’s Town was also a huge sign that was visible to band member Mark Stoermer through his room window when he was young.
The band fired manager Braden Merrick in 2006. Merrick later filed a lawsuit against the band for breach of contract and their new manager and lawyer, Robert Reynolds, for $16 million each. The band counter sued, citing that Merrick’s poor management had cost them millions. The case was settled in 2009.
Invited by U.S. President Barack Obama, the band played on the White House South Lawn on July 4, 2010, for the second annual “Salute to the Military” United Service Organizations concert as part of Independence Day celebrations, which Flowers described as a “monumental honor”
Flowers has released two solo albums, Flamingo released in 2010 and named after Flamingo Road in Flowers’ hometown of Las Vegas and The Desired Effect (2015). Both albums peaked at No.1 on the UK charts.
From 2006 to 2016, the Killers released annual Christmas-themed singles and videos in aid of the charity Product Red, supporting The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.
Wonderful Wonderful (2017) became the band’s first album to reach the number one spot on the US Billboard 200, it also claimed the top spot on the UK Album Chart, making the Killers the first international act to have their first five studio albums reach number one in the UK.
In addition to his work with the Killers, bassist Mark Stoermer has released three solo albums, Another Life in 2011, Dark Arts in 2016, and Filthy Apes and Lions in 2017.
From 2017 to the end of 2020, guitarist Dave Keuning was on hiatus from the band. He returned to The Killers to assist in recording their 2021 album Pressure Machine. Keuning released a solo album titled Prismism under his surname Keuning in 2019.
In 2023, Flowers performed alongside Elton John (for his final ever UK performance), at the Glastonbury Festival wearing a red suit, black shoes with a pale blue shirt. They performed a version of ‘Tiny Dancer’. John listed Flowers as one of his top five heroes while editing The Independent’s World Aids Day special edition.
The Killers are considered one of the biggest rock bands of the 21st century, selling more than 28 million records worldwide, including 10.8 million in the US alone. They have performed in over 50 countries and on six continents.
