The promoter of one of their early UK gigs has been talking about the night The Killers played Lincoln’s tiny Bivouac Club.
In an interview with the BBC, Steve Hawkins, who ran the club – a windowless room above the Duke Of Wellington pub – has been recalling what happened when the band played in November 2003.
"Their booking agent contacted me asking if I'd do them a favour and book this unknown band," said Hawkins. "Within three seconds of their soundcheck, I knew they were going to be absolutely massive. I remember rushing up to the band afterwards and saying, ‘you are the new Duran Duran.’”
The Las Vegas band were supporting British Sea Power (now simply Sea Power) that night. Their guitarist Martin Noble remembers giving the group a guided tour of the historic market town: “They were amazed by the fog. They had never been to the UK before and it was a very foggy day. We took them up to see the cathedral and they saw the cobbled streets. It blew their minds.”
At the time Sea Power were promoting their critically acclaimed debut album The Decline Of British Sea Power, whilst the Killers were merely the latest in a succession of post-Strokes US bands, albeit one with prominent Anglo reference points - The Smiths and New Order being two of the more obvious. It was the first time they’d played in the UK.
“They weren’t quite as glamorous as they are now," Martin laughs. "You could have mistaken them for a band from York. We all thought, yeah, they are all right this lot, they might go somewhere."
That night they doubtless played Mr Brightside, which at the time had just been released as their debut single. At last count it’s clocked up 408 weeks in the UK charts - that’s over seven and a half years.
Six months later the band’s debut album Hot Fuss was released, and the Killers left the UK toilet circuit behind them for good. Hawkins tried to book them as headliners in 2004, but was outbid by Leeds University.
Sadly the Bivouac went the way of so many small venues - Hawkins stopped promoting there in 2009. Two years later, the Duke of Wellington itself shut its doors for the final time: it’s now offices.
But for the 200 who were there that night, and Hawkins, there are always the memories: “The four guys were incredibly professional and within seconds I knew they knew what they were doing,” he remembers. “The are the nicest people I have ever had come through my doors at the Bivouac."
