Brandon Flowers Reveals His Real Origin Story at Royal Albert Hall: "I Can Love New Order and Johnny Cash"

Brandon Flowers brought the‘Thrasher’tour to London’s Royal Albert Hall on Thursday, October 15, and used the 20-song set to tell a story he’s been sitting on for decades. The Killers frontman told the crowd his parents moved him from Las Vegas to a small town in Utah when he was eight years old, and that the music in that house was Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and Waylon Jennings. That upbringing is the foundation of‘Thrasher’, his first solo album in over a decade.

The setlist leaned into that duality all night. New tracks‘Tiger’s Blood’,‘Plans’and‘Miss America’shared space with Killers favorites like‘Read My Mind’,‘When You Were Young’,‘In the Car Outside’and‘In Another Life’, plus solo cut‘Crossfire’. Flowers also addressed the obvious question head-on, joking that people ask when he went country, and that it took about 16 years for anyone to notice. His best moment came when he explained his whole approach: he can love New Order and Johnny Cash, nobody is keeping score, and he wonders what New Order would sound like if they were Johnny Cash.

There’s more coming, too. Flowers has said‘Thrasher’is the first of two connected solo albums, with the follow-up already completed. The UK and Ireland tour continues in Bristol on October 17 before wrapping later this month.

Are you team country Brandon or team Vegas Brandon? Tell us in the comments.