"They say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. But that is a crock of shit because tonight The Killers are at Wembley Stadium!"
So says Brandon Flowers, loudly and happily as the night approaches its final stages. But its a celebration for his band - barely 10 years after first taking to a stage in this country, The Killers have made it to the biggest one the UK has to offer.
It's an impressive list of contemporaries they find themselves in. As a slightly bizarre tribute song to Wembley hinted, the stadium has welcomed such acts as Queen, U2, The Who, The Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen, Oasis, et all down the years, as well as more modern arrivals like Foo Fighters, Green Day, Coldplay and Muse.
With the Vegas band having sold out 13 arena shows last autumn and played headline festival sets in the UK for years, it feels like a natural step to make the jump into such a venue. They prove this almost immediately, as Brandon Flowers serenades the venue solo with Sam's Town intro Enterlude before the opening chords of When You Were Young sends 75,000 people into glorious delirium and pyro explodes left, right and centre.
The band certainly has the back catalogue for this show. Spaceman and Smile Like You Mean It are delightful indie anthems that get the stadium vocals. They're also joined by lesser known songs such as Battle Born song The Way It Was and earlier album tracks This River Is Wild and Bling (Confession of a King), which more than hold their own in this humungous environment.
The setlist is honed from months of touring. The cover of Joy Division's Shadowplay, accompanied by a monstrous laser show, slides into Miss Atomic Bomb - and a huge cloud of pyro - and the knockout one-two of Human and Somebody Told Me. This being stadiums - the former of those two has its own galaxy of lasers zipping across the venue, while the latter has an exciting bass-led intro that slides into the actual song.
The usual stadium rock touches are also around - fans holding up their mobile phones and lighters for the chill piano ballad Here With Me, while Dave Keuning and Ronnie Vannucci play mesmerising and brilliant solos before the jaunty From Here On Out.
Flowers on the other hand acts as the ringmaster, leading the crowd through extended sing-alongs of a cover of I Think We're Alone Now and From Here On Out, whipping up the crowd while strumming the bass in For Reasons Unknown, and bouncing around with the frenzied crowd.
The surprise comes when the band launch into an ode to Wembley after A Dustland Fairytale. It's an unexpected touch that is simultaneously hit and miss but it somehow works, and it certainly adds to the celebratory air of occasion that this band has, through all the solo projects, style blunders and fun with the critics, made it to such a huge environment.
After this the main set is a run through of hits, culminating in All These Things That I've Done. The songs "I've got soul but I'm not a soldier" chant has finally found a room big enough to hold it, while an avalanche of confetti blankets the standing zone.
The band returns for a 4 song encore, split 50/50 between Hot Fuss and Battle Born. The title track from the latter is extended to preposterous lengths, with pyro and confetti zipping all over the place as Flowers high-fives the front rows and Keuning shreds his guitar to bits.
And all this before the high-point for many - the song that started this journey, no less. It is incredible to think that Mr Brightside is the first song the band ever wrote, but it's still going strong, and it is certainly right at home in this cavern of steel and concrete. Here it brings the curtain down on the evening, with one final crazy mosh for the audience that responds with suitable delirium.
Such a marvellous evening's entertainment has proved what fans of the band have been saying for years - The Killers are in the big leagues. Although where they go from here is anyone's guess.
The only complaints can really be for the hardcores gutted they didn't see the band play a few surprise rarities in an after-show gig at the Relentless Garage across town. But here, the band have delivered a fantastic evening.
4/5
Supporting the band for this big show were The Gaslight Anthem and James.
James opened the show and delivered a tight set of songs from their 90s heyday, with singer Tim Booth delivering some amusing observations and crazy dancing to go with their pleasant music.
The New Jersey-based Gaslight Anthem may well have been a better fit the week before when Springsteen was in town - and indeed, they have performed with The Boss. They took a few songs to warm up but the quality of their songs significantly improved the further their performance carried on.
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