Killers frontman Brandon Flowers watches England beat The Netherlands with fans at their concert. Killers frontman Brandon Flowers watches England beat The Netherlands with fans at their concert. (@exprofis on X/Twitter.)
By Andrew Bucholtz on

Over the years, there have been many pop and rock songs that have wound up associated with the English men’s national soccer team. The latest is The Killers’ 2004 single “Mr. Brightside.” And it got there in a particularly special way.

That song from the Las Vegas-formed band has been relatively popular around the world, and has turned into a thing at quite a few sporting events (perhaps especially Michigan Wolverines’ home football games). But it’s even more popular in the United Kingdom, where it’s regularly used in a variety of situations, including closing the night at bars and clubs. Earlier this year, “Mr. Brightside” became the U.K.’s third-biggest song ever (in terms of sales and streams). And last week saw The Killers presented with Guinness World Records for most cumulative weeks on the UK singles chart (one song) and the longest stay on the UK singles chart by a group, both 416 weeks at that point.

That set up what happened Wednesday night. The Killers are playing a six-date residency at London’s O2 Arena, with Wednesday the fifth of those sixth concerts. But it had some pretty notable entertainment competition from England taking on the Netherlands in the Euro 2024 semifinals. No problem…the band put the match up on the big screen behind them, and 10 songs into the concert, they paused to watch the last two minutes of the match with fans. And after England secured a 2-1 victory following Ollie Watkins’ 90th-minute strike, the band fired off red and white confetti cannon and broke into “Mr. Brightside,” and the crowd went wild:

This certainly isn’t the first time a song has taken off around the English men’s soccer team, whether officially or unofficially. And it’s not the first time a band has leaned into it, either. In 1990, New Order put out “World In Motion” with members of the England team (including John Barnes rapping), which singer Bernard Sumner called “the last straw for Joy Division fans.” 1996 saw the first version of “Three Lions” (better known as “It’s Coming Home”) by David Baddiel and Frank Skinner and the Lightning Seeds, and that’s remained a thing. And Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline” has become quite prominent around the English men’s and women’s teams, as it is with many other sports teams, including the Boston Red Sox.

Maybe the strangest, and most fun, crossover here came from England’s 5-1 win over Germany in World Cup qualifying in 2001. That spawned at least three songs:  “England 5 – Germany 1” by the Business, “Sven Sven Sven” by Bell & Spurling, and “Keep On Movin’ – World Cup 2002 Remix” by the then-breaking-up Five. That latter one extensively featured legendary announcer John Motson‘s call of that match (and a bit of the later England-Greece match that actually secured 2002 FIFA World Cup qualification for England), and stands out as one of the strangest mixes of music and sports announcing that somehow mostly works, even challenging Phil Rizzuto’s claimed lack of double entendre knowledge.

We’ll see if “Mr. Brightside” continues to be associated with the English team going forward, and if it can join the ranks of some of those past memorable music-sports connections around them. But it sure was part of a perfect moment for England fans at this concert on Wednesday night. For this part of this tournament, at least, they were indeed doing just fine.

[NME; top image from @exprofis on X/Twitter]

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.

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