Much like puberty, hangovers, and the sun surely rising and falling, ‘Mr. Brightside’ is an inevitable part of life.
The Killers’ urgent tale of paranoia and jealousy didn’t just cement them as one of the biggest bands in the world, it’s outgrown them to become the kind of canonised pop culture monolith most artists only dream of writing.
It’s a hit that simply won’t die.
Officially turning 20 years old this week (hey, you can buy it a beer!), ‘Mr. Brightside’ has spent a record-busting five years in the UK charts, has had nearly 2 BILLION(!!!) combined plays across streaming platforms, and to this day, is the longest-running track on Australia Top 50 Chart on Spotify, at 352 straight weeks.
It’s not only emblematic of 2000s indie rock, coming behind only Arctic Monkeys in Double J’s list of the 50 Best Debut Singles, but has become an inescapable standard belted out at pretty much anywhere it’s socially acceptable for people to gather: clubs, 21sts, weddings, karaoke, festivals (whether The Killers are on the line-up or not) - you name it.
“I never get bored of singing it,” frontman Brandon Flowers told Spin in 2015.
"We’ve never not played that song live, because it’s stood the test of time and I’m proud of it.”
It’s also become a sporting event staple, chanted at football matches across Britain and America.
Here in Australia, many fondly remember when The Killers performed ‘Mr. Brightside’ at the 2017 AFL Grand Final, joined by Richmond's then vice-captain Jack Riewoldt after the Tigers took the premiership.
It’s almost as if every time people shout along to the song - in public or private - the lifespan of ‘Mr. Brightside’ is extended, like some kind of zeitgeist loophole for eternal life. And its simplicity makes it the perfect tune for crowd participation.
You don’t have to be able to hold a tune to sing the largely one-note verse melody. And the chorus is only a little more adventurous.
Besides that, the momentum and energy of the thing doesn’t just encourage you to join in, it practically demands you to give it the same passion that Flowers does.
Thanks to streaming services, it found a new lease of life as a permanent fixture of countless playlists - regardless of genre or era - and continues to chart around the world. At one point in 2017, it was streamed more than any other song released before 2010.
It’s an immediately recognisable, stone cold classic that’s landed in three separate triple j Hottest 100 countdowns. (#13 in 2004; #38 in a 2009 ‘All Time’ poll; #7 in 2013 for the Hottest 100 of the Past 20 Years).
So… how has it endured? Why do we all still make such a hot fuss over ‘Mr. Brightside’?
It started out with a miss
Remarkably, ‘Mr. Brightside’ flopped upon its initial release on 29 September, 2003.
It was only after The Killers’ second single ‘Somebody Told Me’ made a dent in the Top 20 (in the US, UK, and Australia) that they decided to re-release the track in the lead up to their (now 4x Platinum certified) debut album Hot Fuss.
Coming out of its cage (again) in 2004, ‘Mr. Brightside’ was doing just fine. A relatively modest success that reached #10 in both the US and UK, and peaking at #39 Down Under.
Despite not hitting #1, it’s cultural shelf life has clearly outlasted the radio-friendly RnB (Usher, Black Eyed Peas) and TV competition singers (Shannon Noll, Guy Sebastian, Casey Donovan) that did end up topping the early ‘00s charts.
Aside from some dominating presences - say Britney Spears and Eminem - there’s very few examples of the era that have sustained the same kind of success and reverence.
‘Mr. Brightside’ didn’t really have a pop culture moment at the time.
Sure, The Killers was touted as part of the 2000s resurgence of guitar bands (along with The Strokes, The Hives, The White Stripes, The Vines, and Arctic Monkeys) but the song - surprisingly - never featured in an ad campaign or big marketing push.
The song definitely benefited from The Killers showing up in beloved ‘00s teen drama The OC, as one of the first bands to rock the show’s in-world venue The Bait Shop, but it hardly blew up from just that appearance.
It’s only major film moment was in the mostly-forgotten rom-com The Holiday, where Cameron Diaz, wine in hand, demonstrates the song’s power even when alone in your lounge room.
The 2003 single wasn’t just The Killers’ debut, it’s literally been around as long as the band. It featured in their first-ever show in 2002, at a Las Vegas venue called Cafe Roma. And before even that, it was the first song they ever wrote.
Des-tin-y is calling
It’s 2001, and an eager-eyed 20-year-old named Brandon Flowers is scouring the classifieds of a local Vegas paper. He responds to an ad listing from 25-year-old guitarist Dave Keuning.
Bonding over a love of groups like Oasis, The Smiths, The Cure, and New Order, the pair already had ambitions to be One Of The Greats.
Keuning had a tape of what would become the iconic guitar riff that opens ‘Mr. Brightside’. Flowers heard it and was immediately inspired.
“When I first heard those chords, I wrote the lyrics down and we didn’t waste much time,” he told Spin in 2015. “That’s also why there’s not a second verse. The second is the same as the first. I just didn’t have any other lines and it ended up sticking.”
The duo quickly made a rough demo (eventually released on the Direct Hits compilation), and while the crude recording lacks the punch and polish of the finished product, its potential is all there: the instant sing-along factor, the sense of urgency, and the bittersweet flavour of betrayal.
“I still remember the hairs on my arm standing up when I heard our demo for the first time,” Flowers told Rolling Stone in 2018.
Destiny was calling Flowers and Keuning. They’d bottled lightning into an infectious, captivating anthem. And they knew it.
‘Mr. Brightside’ was the only song to survive when the band scrapped everything they’d written after hearing The Strokes’ 2001 debut album Is This It.
Smart move. The Killers have had plenty of hits since, but none have achieved the deathless popularity of their very first single.
It was only a kiss...
From those opening notes to the repeated wails of ‘I neeeeveerrrr’ that close it, ‘Mr. Brightside’ is nothing if not melodramatic. But it continues to resonate with people because it taps into timeless feelings: heartbreak, betrayal, paranoia, a sense of triumph over tragedy.
Flowers wrote the lyrics around the end of his first serious relationship, after discovering his girlfriend with another guy at a local bar. The same partner that had accompanied the frontman to a transformative Oasis show in 2001 that sent him searching for bandmates to begin with.
“The wound was raw,” he told The Guardian in 2019. “It was cathartic for me. There was still something really romantic about it: it was before phones. I actually put pen to paper and we were able to turn that into something universal."
"To make betrayal sound so good was just a lucky thing that I stumbled upon.”
He also took inspiration from a mood board of British artists: Oasis’ ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’, Depeche Mode’s ‘I Feel You’, and Pet Shop Boys’ ‘Jealousy’.
Flowers also admits to liberally borrowing from the late, great David Bowie’s ‘Queen Bitch’, from 1971 album Hunky Dory, essentially rewriting its lyric: ‘And I’m phoning a cab/ ‘Cause my stomach feels small’.
“I was obsessed with Hunky Dory when I was 19,” he told Rolling Stone. “There’s an urgency to that, and it felt like he meant business, so I was like, ‘All right, I want to do that.'”
As for the song’s title? There’s little significance to the name so many of us have screamed at the top of our lungs.
“It was just something I came up with,” Flowers told The Guardian with a shrug in 2019.
That speaks volumes about how this tale of infidelity manages to stick, even without the specifics.
As words on a page, the lyrics are evocative but not masterful (‘Gotta, gotta be down because I want it all’ Really?) but as a performance? Sung as if our lives depend on it, with surging musical backing, it taps into intense sensations we’ve all felt at some point or other.
Love has a way of getting us in our feelings so deeply; our emotions so severe they demand to be expressed. ‘It’s killing meeeee’.
But much like another deathless emo anthem from the ‘00s heyday that’s carried on - My Chemical Romance’s ‘The Black Parade’ - there’s a silver lining.
A message of acceptance, that there’s hope in moving forward past a relationship that’s run its course to look on the bright side.
How did it end up like this?
At 20 years old, ‘Mr. Brightside’ is obviously weapon-grade nostalgia for those who originally grew up with it - white people catnip for the 2000s Uni kids who associate it with their glory days.
But it clearly endures as one of the widely-regarded greats of the era because of its significance to a whole new generation who are just as familiar with the song and its ageless rush.
Despite logic, ‘Mr. Brightside’ has managed to retain its status as an invincible sing-along regardless of its audience or setting. Its climactic power is undiminished.
It predates a time before the internet was truly the dominant marketing and music discovery force it is now, but it’s as much an omnipresent blockbuster as any of the other viral songs that thrive on saturation.
As with recent Gen Z anthems - such as ’Heat Waves’, 'bad guy', and ‘The Less I Know The Better’ - you’ll have no trouble finding any number of ‘Mr. Brightside’ memes and TikToks.
That should be proof enough that it’s wild popularity is about much more than clinical marketing and algorithms. It’s organic.
It will forever be that kinda-cheesy but ultimately ridiculously feel-good sing-along that comes on near the end of the night.
Is it overplayed? Yes, absolutely. Does it still slap? Without a doubt.
That’s the mark of any great song that stands the test of time; in the end, applying science and analysis to its magic is futile.
‘Mr. Brightside’ abides because it’s an absolute banger.
Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated Jack Riewoldt was captain of Richmond Football Club in 2017.