The Killers wouldn't exist without Oasis

lead singer Brandon Flowers was fired by his first band in 2001 a since pop act called blush response but he said everything changed after going to see an oasis show at the Hard Rock Hotel in Las Vegas witnessing a room full of people singing along to Don't Look Back in Anger showed him the anthemic power that music can have and even inspired him to write Mr bright side as a response after that night flower said his calling was to be in a rock band and he began to search for like-minded musicians but he wasn't optimistic as for years nobody shared his love of British bands with Las Vegas feeling like it was on another planet but after trolling through newspaper ads for musicians and passing over a seemingly endless array of guitarists who were into new metal and hard rock he found guitarist Dave coings advert where he was looking for a band with Oasis cited as an influence when the pair met they quickly bonded over their shared love of British music and immediately began writing songs together in cooning apartment after bringing in drummer Ronnie venucci and basist mark sturmer the band was invited to perform at showcases to some of the biggest major labels in America but the big wig struggled to understand the appeal of a band that wore their British influences so proudly on their sleeves Mr bright side was the first song they wrote together that flowers' dream of having it sung back at him like the heroes in Oasis and the Smiths was looking far-fetched but fortuitously they caught the eye of UK an anr rep Alex Gilbert who brought their demo back to the UK and showed it to a friend at small independent label Lizard King records despite not meeting the band in person Lizard King were quick to offer them a deal based on the strength of the five song demo The Killers didn't even have passports at the time but they signed with the British label in July 2003 as flowers remembered when speaking to the guardian 20 years later we were genuinely excited that at least we were going to get this trip to England out of it because it seemed like it was over then the nme wrote a positive review of a show that we did in the Dublin castle and it changed the trajectory of Our Lives flowers was the sixth born child to parents in Las veg Vegas and his religious backstory is well documented he wasn't brought up with money and his family moved to smalltown Utah as a youngster he relocated back to Vegas in his teens to go to high school Mormons are perhaps unlikely candidates for rock and roll stars as they traditionally reject Pursuits like alcohol drugs promiscuous sex smoking and even tattoos and flowers briefly considered rebelling against the religion by getting an oasis logo ined on his body he has an older brother who is Into The Beatles morisy In The Cure and Brandon would sneak into his room as a child at listen to his records he said we grew up on British rock and roll a new way of Music it was a healthy diet second single somebody told me was released in March 2004 and was a turning point in the band's fortunes it charted at number 28 becoming their first hit inside the coveted top 40 the video saw them perform in Las Vegas in front of giant screens in homage to the killers from the New Order video it became a huge hit on mtv2 and was replayed several times a day third single all these things that I've done did even better reaching number 18 it's famous refrain if I've got a soul but I'm not a soldier was sung in Festival Fields throughout the summer of 2004 flower said that during one of the band's first trips to the UK for the enemy award his hero N Gallagher came backstage and said he'd worked out how to play the song on guitar it was surreal because less than a year before I was sitting on my bed with a guitar without a record deal trying to work out Oasis TR hot fuss was released in the UK and the US in June 2004 with the hype from across the pond finally attracting major label interest in the home country and Island Records will put it out Stateside it quickly became one of the most essential rock records of the Year influential UK publication drowning sound named it as their number two best album in 2004 not everyone was enamored with the production though which saw flowers' vocals autot tuned and at times featuring distracting echoey effects but fans lapped it up and hot fuss went on to sell almost 2 and a half million copies in the UK which means around one in every 25 people owns it the reviews weren't always kind and the guardian even suggested glamorous indie rock and roll was a spoof of an oasis Anthem and it wasn't just the Gallagher's perfect choruses that the killers were inspired by during the mid 2000s as oasis's music began to fade from relevance the brothers carved out a niche humorously criticizing just about anyone and everyone they memorably called Chris Martin from cplay a plant pot and said block party looked like a band from University challenge it kept them in the papers which led Brandon Flowers to adopt a similarly scathing Persona and he seemed to enjoy dismissing other bands one recipient of his trash talking was the New York axe The Bravery who like The Killers leaned heavily on UK indcs of the 1980s their single and honest mistake became a hit in the UK and it was released a year after the killers had their own breakthrough it's a catchy earworm with a baseline that pretty shamelessly rips off off new orders Blue Monday but it's probably what they're best remembered for today but The Bravery were parachuted straight onto to Major label polydor with flowers suggesting they had piggybacked off the Killer's success he snarkily told MTV in March 2005 that they had only been signed because the killers existed a couple of years later he'd call up The Bravery lead singer to apologize and he told singer Phoebe bridges in a recent interview that he was inspired to create a spiky Persona due to his agulation of the Gallagher brothers I grew up idolizing aasis and they wrote great songs but they were also just big talkers for some reason I thought to gain respect that was part of the territory and that's not who I am at all but there were a few people I ended up calling and apologizing to later on