“boy” by The Killers is several weeks old at this point. I have considered writing about every Friday since it was released, but didn’t because I feel like I wrote a lot about The Killers last year with their album Pressure Machine. Also, I’m pretty sure people who like The Killers already know about the song, and I’m probably not going to sell anybody who doesn’t like The Killers at this point, especially not with this song which is very much Killersesque. So up until today I always chose another song to write about that people might not know instead.

Two things pushed me over the edge into actually writing about it this week. First, I didn’t have anything else new in the docket for this week. Second, this week’s Switched on Pop episode was a hilarious look at The Killers music. Seriously, I could not stop laughing at how outraged Nate was at their lyrics. I mean he’s not actually wrong at how ridiculous some of them are, but I honestly have never really processed them enough to think about it. I’m caught up in the momentum of the music and general story of the songs and the details of the lyrics don’t matter. As someone who thought I didn’t like The Killers for a very long time because the only song I really knew was “Mr. Brightside”, which I hated when it came out and still hate now, I loved the whole discussion even though my reasons for not liking them for a very long time were not the same as Nate’s. Once I dug further into their catalog, I discovered that I am in fact a big fan of The Killers. Pressure Machine was one of my favorite albums of 2021, and in October they very well may be my first big indoor concert since COVID happened. I have tickets and am telling myself that I’m going to go, but whether I chicken out last minute or not remains to be seen.

Anyway, “boy” is a new single they just released a few weeks ago. My understanding it is that the song was actually written prior to the Pressure Machine album and was sort of the springboard for it even though it didn’t wind up on the album itself. It definitely sounds like The Killers. You would immediately be able to peg it as being one of their songs as soon as you hear it. The real delight for me in the song is the synth that sounds very much like Erasure’s “A Little Respect”, which is a song I love. At first I thought they might have even sampled it though in listening to both songs together I believe it’s just inspired by rather than a direct sample. I’m shocked that in the podcast episode only Reanna was the only one who seemed to also recognize that similarity with Charlie and Nate only seemingly hearing it after she told them. Part of me thinks that had to be a bit for the podcast because it seems so obvious to me, but who knows. Anyway, if you haven’t managed to hear it yet take a listen.