The beautiful losers that populate Brandon Flowers' songs haven't got it easy. When they're not "playing with fire . . . out on a wire" ("Playing With Fire"), they're "caught up in the crossfire of heaven and hell" ("Crossfire"). As lead singer and main songwriter for the Killers, Flowers has become our staunchest Born to Run-era Bruce Springsteen revivalist, and on his first album as a solo artist he pumps up the pomp, delivering surging synth-rock crescendos and belting out lyrics like "Woke up in the rusted frame of a burned-out old DeVille" ("Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas"). It would be laughable if Flowers wasn't 100 percent committed, and if the hooks on Flamingo weren't irresistible. He is, and they are — and you'll be too busy singing along to giggle.

“Everyday People”

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.