The Killers “Goodnight, Travel Well”
Packaged at the tail-end of an album whose entire prior mood was based in upbeat pop thrills, Day & Age’s near-seven minute album-closer “Goodnight, Travel Well” felt too long, too broody and too dull in this context, a deflating punctuation to all the bright and shiny going-ons that preceded it.
When taken in apart from it’s trackmates though, the Killers‘ song immediately stands tall as an extraordinary monument, powerfully communicating the internal anguish and feelings of powerlessness that arise when one is forced to deal with the uncompromising reality of death.
“The unknown distance to the Great Beyond/ Stares back at my grieving frame/ To cast my shadow by the holy sun/ My spirit moans with a sacred pain,” numbly mourns Brandon Flowers in the opening verse, as sunless sonic detailings (bellowing orchestrations, doomsday tick tock effects) increasingly loom heavy and large around him.
As the arrangement grows ever more intense, so does his lumped throat ramblings, evolving through a striking array of varying inner-emotions (The lines “Stay, don’t leave me/ The stars can wait for your sign/ Don’t signal now” being the most heart-wrenching) before coming to a climactic release where he finally reaches some sort of closure towards his painful loss.
It’s a stunning masterwork that forces one to look at the Vegas boys in a totally new and different way.
Catch the equally amazing video, a collaboration between the band, UNICEF and MTV Exit to raise awareness of sex trafficking, below:
Easily my favorite song on the album. And that last line that you mentioned is the most moving of the song.