"All These Things I've Done" by The Killers, Wednesday, February 19, 2021

Today was on course to be a perfect day. Solved a banking problem, tried a new Starbucks beverage, got a new shield for my new MacBook Air, tried Shake Shack for the first time (so far the only place in Korea to get beef hotdogs as far as I know), shopping in the department store, bought soft tofu covered sushi for dinner and took it to go. But in the middle of this rare Covid shopping trip, I get an upsetting Kakao text from a coworker about work. So in the middle of vacation, my mind has been corrupted with work. And it's not like it was anything urgent. Like a text from work on a perfect vacation day, the hopeful message of this song is about the struggle through adversity. I heard this song today in Shake Shack, and it seems to fit the mood best.

DON'T YOU PUT ME ON THE BACK BURNER. "Somebody Told Me" was my first introduction to this band. You couldn't miss the song, even if you only listened to the radio occasionally. Brandon Flowers sounded so much like The Cure's Robert Smith, and the band helped to make the '80s cool again. I didn't like the song very much, though. I thought it was too worldly in high school. Is Brandon Flowers saying his ex became a lesbian? Oh, my evangelical times. "All the Things I've Done" was the band's third single, but I never heard it until college. It was a classroom in one of the Christian high schools I had to observe for my Intro to Secondary Education class. The song was played in a film for Invisible Children, an organization whose aim is to raise awareness about child soldiers in Central Africa. Later I heard this song everywhere as my college also got involved with the organization. 

YOU GOTTA HELP ME OUT. From an early age, I've been fascinated with Mormonism. From the religion's history founded in the United States, to the narratives taught in the Book of Mormon involving American history, to the beliefs of the people, to the quiet influence it's had on Hollywood, music, writing, and politics--it's a story of America that parallels my own religious tradition of Seventh-day Adventism. Reading the lyrics of this song, many commentators reference the Bible and Mormon symbolism, pointing out that this song is a struggle between the sex and drinking of rock 'n' roll and the straight-and-narrow of a rigorous faith tradition. Following Flowers career both in his solo work and with The Killers, I wonder about this struggle. Flowers is a very public figure and he is devoted to his beliefs. But many of his lyrics paint a different picture than the squeaky clean Mormon image. This could be my complete misunderstanding of the religion. What I do get from Flowers is honesty dealing with love, life, art, and religion. Perhaps we may someday look to him as we look to Bono. Only "time, truth, and hearts" will tell.