Culture Club: Flamingo (Vertigo/Mercury), Brandon Flowers

Readers review this week's big album

"Absolute rubbish. This isn't music. This is just some millionaire middle-class whiner who thinks that four chords and a rhyming dictionary make him some kind of hero. And there are, unfortunately, a lot of "bands" like this – and they have almost successfully managed to make rubbish sound even more rubbish."

Pablo Fanquez

"Absolutely brilliant. There are not many albums that impress you a quarter of the way through like this one does, and what's even rarer is that it manages to keep that feeling up until the last track."

Vadim Nahalov

"It's catchy, melodic, and very Killers-esque – so fans of the band won't be disappointed. Flowers is the anti-rocker's rocker. Thoughtful, poised and clearly not so far (yet!) from his Mormon roots – but in love with a bit of flashy bling and melodrama. His mother's death surely played a part in extending the hiatus The Killers are taking – perhaps this is a kind of catharsis for him. He's not breaking new ground with this album – but he is sticking to what he knows best, and fortunately, what really works."

Jonathan Wogel

"Despite Brandon Flowers' position as the good-looking and charismatic front man of The Killers, his debut solo effort is a complete and utter let down. I only managed to listen to a few songs on the album, which were unmemorable, before I wanted to fall asleep."

Caroline Perkins

"A little sterile and rather flat, the album sounds like a Killers album with the better bits removed. The single "Crossfire" is a peculiar mix of the pious and nonsensical, with lots of talk of the devil and crossroads – but at least it allows Flowers the opportunity to do what he does best: knock out a tub-thumping chorus in his yodelling style, which, if weird, is at least his own. Unfortunately, that's about the only thing that is a recognisable product of Brandon Flowers the individual, rather than Flowers the Killers' lead singer. A missed opportunity, I think."

Samuel Jones

"Dross. Drippy, wet, dross. I can't think of anything worse than suffering an hour of this. On Spotify there's a bonus track where he completely lifts the vocal phrasing and melody from a bit of "American Pie" on a few lines; or was he just being so ironic that I didn't get it? Either way, it's bobbins. Next please!"

Matthew Smith

"I've never been the biggest fan of The Killers – I always found them to be a bit style over substance. However, I've seen them play live a few times and I do think they can be pretty entertaining to watch at a festival or something; it's just that I would never sit at home and listen to their music in my bedroom. That said, I was curious to hear how Brandon Flowers' solo effort would sound, but it just sounds exactly the same as The Killers. It's the same guitars, same big choruses, same voice, same subject matter. I don't really see why he bothered, except to perhaps get more famous himself."

Julie Norwich

"Why did The Killers' front man Brandon Flowers bother to make a solo record? It sounds just like The Killers at their most terrible."

Alexa Denbigh

"I only heard the song "Crossfire" on the album, but it sounded just like U2."

Godfrey Gunner

"Inconsequential."

Antonella Di Franco

Next week in Culture Club: 'Tamara Drewe'

Please email your views on Stephen Frears's adaptation of Posy Simmonds's comic strip, starring Gemma Arterton, to cultureclub@independent.co.uk. The best will be published next Thursday