The Killers | The Leak | Album Preview

In May, Brandon Flowers boasted that the follow-up to the Killers' multi-platinum smash debut LP Hot Fuss would be "one of the best albums in the past 20 years," bragging to MTV News. "There's nothing that touches this album." Perhaps to make this claim possible, his band then hired two of the producers responsible for some of the past two decades' major rock albums — Flood and Alan Moulder — who have, together and separately, worked with U2, Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails and Depeche Mode. After sessions in their Las Vegas hometown, the group emerged with Sam's Town, a grand album of epic ballads and gigantic sounds with ambitious ideas to match. • The album's title refers to Sam Boyd, who arrived in Las Vegas in 1941 and started a career in the city's casinos that transformed him from a poor card dealer into a wealthy casino owner by the end of the '60s. • Flowers says he labored over the selection of "When You Were Young" as the album's first single. "It's a big decision, and you have to be careful with it. Of course you want people to know it's The Killers, but you also want to blow them away. It's a tough place to be right now, because the last few bands that put out a second album — bands like Franz Ferdinand or Hot Hot Heat — they seem to go away so quickly. And that's a little bit scary, but you just have to have faith in your songs." • One of the band's biggest influences on Sam's Town was Bruce Springsteen, who frontman Flowers calls "a gift." "Springsteen touches on the American dream, and that's everybody's dream. And it's such a great idea — whether or not it's still happening today. Most of the songs are about getting to that place, of making it to the promised land. I don't think it's about getting rich; it's the idea of working hard and having your castle in the sky," Flowers says. "And that idea runs through the record. It's very optimistic. And we're all from working-class families, and that's why our songs are good, because we don't do it half-assed. Nothing was handed to us, and so we don't settle. We're not afraid to throw a song away because it's not good enough. A lot of people won't do that." • "Uncle Jonny" is a cautionary tale about cocaine and "Why Do I Keep Counting?" is evidently about Flowers' fear of flying. • Tim Burton is directing the video for "Bones," marking his music-video debut. The clip will include live performance footage of the Killers mixed with computer graphics and models, including Burton's signature skeletons. "A lot of the models and sets are based on historic Las Vegas — on things that aren't there anymore, like the Glass Pool Inn, this really cool place that was torn down a few years ago that was down at the south end of the Strip," drummer Ronnie Vannucci says. —provided by MTV News

Killers Album Preview: Massive Sound, Epic Ballads, Big Ideas Fill 'Sam's Town'

MTV News Archive: The Killers