
In this quiet town they know how to live, good people who lean on Jesus, they're quick to forgive in this quiet town
If this life was meant for proving
I could use more years to live
But 15 in a guardhouse
That's more than I'm willing to give
And if there really is a judgement
When he pulls my chart
He'll reject my actions
But he will know my heart
And he'll prepare a place for me
Where happiness instills
And the light puts its loving hands on my head
Free in the West Hills
I could use more years to live
But 15 in a guardhouse
That's more than I'm willing to give
And if there really is a judgement
When he pulls my chart
He'll reject my actions
But he will know my heart
And he'll prepare a place for me
Where happiness instills
And the light puts its loving hands on my head
Free in the West Hills
— "West Hills"
Pressure Machine is the seventh studio album by American rock band The Killers, it was released on August 13, 2021 through Island Records.
The album saw the return of guitarist David Keuning though Covid prevented Mark Stroemer from recording.
The album itself sees a shift in the band's music, going for a more stripped back sound, as well as being a Concept Album based on Brandon Flowers' childhood in Utah.
No singles were released with this album.
Tracklist:
- "West Hills" (5:42)
- "Quiet Town" (4:45)
- "Terrible Thing" (3:52)
- "Cody" (3:50)
- "Sleepwalker" (4:27)
- "Runaway Horses" feat. Phoebe Bridgers (3:54)
- "In the Car Outside" (5:28)
- "In Another Life" (3:45)
- "Desperate Things" (5:16)
- "Pressure Machine" (5:09)
- "The Getting By" (5:09)
The Troping By:
- Alliterative Title: "Terrible Thing".
- Alternate Album Cover: The Deluxe edition shows a different image of the album cover but in colour.
- Concept Album: Pressure Machine is a concept album about Flowers' childhood in Nephi, Utah, told from the perspective of the people there.
- Deliberately Monochrome: The cover shows a greyscale image of a trio of crosses behind some barbed wire.
- Eagleland: Perhaps perfected with a somber mood for this album.
- Gayngst-Induced Suicide: The narrator of "Terrible Thing" feels isolated as a gay child in rural Utah in the 1990's, and contemplates suicide while the local Ute Stampede Rodeo is ongoing in town. Flowers said he wrote it based on the experiences he had when he encountered old high school friends later in life who had come out of the closet and discussed their struggles growing up.
- Harbinger of Impending Doom: The Union Pacific trains passing through Nephi in Pressure Machine, in "Quiet Town" killing two high schoolers who are struck by a train and "In The Car Outside" representing the failing loveless marriage of the narrator who watches the trains roll by while questioning his life choices.
- Murder Ballad: "Desperate Things" from Pressure Machine tells a story of a jealous cop who caught up in an affair arrests the abusive husband of his partner and murders him in a dark desert canyon.
- Small Town Boredom: Subverted here as an Older and Wiser Flowers admits in "Quiet Town" he admires his parent's raising him in a small town and the love he experienced there from them.
- Special Guest: Phoebe Bridgers in "Runaway Horses".
- Spoken Word in Music: The album has nearly every song open with a spoken word interview with the people of Nephi, Utah; while the residents discuss stories of faith, love, drug abuse, and small town drama. A film titled Notes from a Quiet Town which was shot on film was later released in 2022 expanding the narrative of the spoken word segments with more features showing the town's inhabitants and their daily lives interspersed between live performances of songs from the album.
- Stranger in a Familiar Land: Much of the album captures the feeling of returning as an adult to your childhood hometown and then discovering the tragedies and struggles which you were oblivious were happening as a child. In the Title Track in particular, its pretty obvious Flowers is saddened by the explosive opioid crisis affecting rural America.
- Sympathetic Murderer: The cop in "Desperate Things" kills the abusive husband of a woman the cop is having an affair with. Its implied the cop has previous encounters with abusive men and he states "I have no patience for guys that hit, for more than just the obvious reasons."
- Very Loosely Based on a True Story: While the story of a cop having an affair with a woman who was with an abusive husband in "Desperate Things" is grounded in real life events that occurred in Nephi, Utah while Brandon lived there... the cop then murdering the abusive husband is fiction.
- We had that treadmill now for months
I think she might've used it once
If I shut my mouth and keep the peace
She'll cook my eggs in bacon grease
Life'll grow you a big red rose
Then rip it from beneath your nose
And run it through the pressure machine
And spit you out a name tag memory
