festival gods smile on The Killers' headline performance

Holding some pretty heady company this weekend, it’s up to The Killers to come out with all guns blazing.

Striding onto stage sporting the most ridiculous shoulderpads the '80s never saw, Brandon Flowers and his bandmates waste no time in doing just that. Within moments they have the crowd singing along en masse to their biggest hit from latest album 'Day and Age', the slow-burning 'Human'. "The festival gods are smiling on us tonight", exclaims Flowers, and this really couldn't be more true; the earlier threats of a gloomy evening have dissipated into a stunning sunset that grows more and more dramatic as the band plays on.

The shoulderpads are soon ditched, and happily they're back to their landmark debut album by song three, a rousing 'Somebody Told Me' sparking a minor frenzy in the audience. It's easy to forget just how many classic songs The Killers have. Through the course of their set they succeed in showcasing all of their albums in abundance, and by necessity this means the show is laden with the big hits, ripe for a drunken singalong. If any band can be accused of musical leapfrogging it's this lot, and the breadth of their setlist testifies to this wilful genre-dabbling.

In a relatively short time The Killers have carved niches as torch holders for anthemic pop, the heirs of Springsteen, and 80s electro revivalists. Tonight they wear all three of these badges with ease, thriving on their headlining slot and laying down each song with a tangible passion and conviction.

The best is left until last. Before the finale, Flowers tells the story of The Killers' origins in a manner not far removed from an '80s reverie, mentioning one song in particular. It is, of course, 'Mr. Brightside', greeted with ecstasy by the crowd from the first chimes of that ubiquitous riff. It's a special moment, but is outdone by what follows, as the band glides into a phenomenal rendition of 'All These Things That I've Done'. It's an outstanding, uplifting experience, and when it comes to it it seems like every voice in Hyde Park is chanting THAT monolithic, gospel-tinged breakdown in unison; "I got soul, but I'm not a soldier."

Put under a microscope, Flower's lyrics can run the risk of looking ill-conceived, even cheesy; animated by thousands of people they feel like a juggernaut, a joyful incantation to a higher power. For the encore they wheel out the underrated 'Bones' and crowd favourite 'When You Were Young', their most self-consciously 'rawk' tune, for a triumphant finish. It's hard to imagine a better soundtrack to a sunset over Hyde Park.

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