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In the brightly colored eighties, Duran Duran were the guiding figures of the New Romantic scene, the stylish, fashion-conscious and fashion.
Commercially oriented side flow of the New Wave. With danceable synth pop, the band from Birmingham hit a nerve with the audience. Duran Duran revolutionized the still young art form of music clip with groundbreaking videos such as the monster hit “The Wild Boys”. Singer Simon Le Bon became a poster boy of the first MTV generation. We take a look at the not consistently stringent discography of the English band.
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Wildest Boys
Duran Duran-Rio (1982): The iconic 80s album
These opposites: a mixture of synth pop and new romantic on the one hand, Andy Taylor’s rock guitar and the saxon fonsolo in the title song on the other. This is Duran Duran’s music in A Nutshell. The band’s second album becomes creative and commercially becoming the first career high point. If an alien wants to learn everything about the sound of the eighties, he only has to hear Rio. But the album also finds its audience on earth, including over there in the USA. After that, as you know, a band cannot stop anything. The iconic cover illustration comes from the American artist Patrick Nagel.
Rating: five stars
Duran Duran – Decade (1989): The best hits on compilation
There should be people who are only interested in the hits of a band. The Compilation Decade is made for them. With songs from all previous albums, she tells the first ten years of Duran Duran, and her development from the synth pop to the radio’n’pop’n’rock in the late 1980s. Decade is also the evidence that Duran Duran has hardly done anything wrong when choosing her singles. Of course, the overlap “The Wild Boys” is on it, which had previously only been the only studio track on the LiveAlbum Arena. And for the first time on a Duran-Duran album: the bond song “A View to a Kill”.
Rating: five and a half stars
Duran Duran-Danse Macabre (2023): Halloween party with cover versions
Studio album number 16 design Duran Duran as a kind of soundtrack for a Halloween party. The band only recorded three new songs for the dance of death. The rest of the album consists of cover versions and reinterpretations of old Duran Duran songs, which are drawn to the dark side of the pop power, such as “Nightboat”. Billie Eilish’s “Bury A Friend” is in a breathtaking version in addition to an interpretation of the disco hit “Supernature” by Cerrone and “Paint It Black” from the Rolling Stones. This reads like a crude compilation, but it makes sense to make a winking gothic sense.
Rating: five stars
Wild boys
Duran Duran-Duran Duran / Debütalbum (1981): The start of the New Romantic era
The first page of Duran Duran’s debut album marks an archetypal moment of the New Romantic movement. In the rushed New Wave Pop songs (“Girls on Film”, “Planet Earth”), which are driven by synthesizers, the echo from bands and musicians such as The Human League, Roxy Music and David Bowie. A few other young bands from Great Britain will subsequently work on Duran Duran and her musical influences. On page 2 of the album, similar to David Bowies Low, experimental electronic moods predominate in songs such as “Nightboat” and the instrumental “Tel Aviv”.
Rating: four and a half stars
Duran Duran – The Wedding Album (1993): “Come Undone” & “Ordinary World”
At the beginning of the nineties, Duran Duran was on an artistic mountain-and-valley trip. Nobody wants to flop their albums and after Nirvana. With its seventh album, the band comes back on track in 1993-not by repeating their hit formula from the past, but by placing themselves with both legs in the pop mainstream of the nineties. With the slit scraps “Come Undone” and “Ordinary World”, Duran Duran show that they are still able to write wonderful pop songs. The wedding video for the latter song runs up and down at MTV, which ensures various number 1 positions.
Rating: Four stars
Duran Duran – Future Past (2021): Between the past and the future
It is thanks to Simon Le Bon’s voice that Duran Duran remain recognizable despite all the stylistic Schlenkern. There are some stylistic Schlenker on the band’s 15th album, but even more Future Past has to offer. Mark Ronson and Erol Alkan are the largest mainstream and underground producers. Graham Coxon (Blur) plays guitar on all songs and Giorgio Moroder can refine two songs with his disco-aura. Rapper Ivorian Doll and the Swede Tove Lo sing with Simon Le Bon. All of this positions Duran Duran somewhere between the past and the future.
Rating: Four stars
Amazon
Boys
Duran Duran-Seven and the Ragged Tiger (1983): The only UK number 1 album
More synthesizer, more Linn-Drums, more dance pop. Duran Duran’s third album fails due to an attempt to exceed the originality of the predecessor Rio. It sounds more to Spandau Ballet than after Duran Duran – and that shouldn’t be a compliment. Nevertheless, Seven and the Ragged Tiger throws three top 10 singles (“Union of Snake”, “New Moon on Monday”, “The Reflex”) and becomes the band’s first and so far only number 1 album in Great Britain. After that, the five breaks down with Simon Le Bon, Andy Taylor, John Taylor, Roger Taylor and Nick Rhodes and will only come back together 21 years later.
Rating: three stars
Duran Duran-Big Thing (1988): Experiments with dance rock
Why not experiment a little around? On Big Thing, her fifth album, Duran Duran give up what you can do best: pop. Many songs have a dance rock paint that is difficult to buy from the band. The album is not the big thing that promises its title, but still has its moments: the artistic ballad “Too Late Marlene”, for example, “I Don’t Want Your Love”, which is influenced by New York Electro Funk, or the ambient pop song “Palomino”, which could also come from David Sylvian. Many fans do not understand this and refuse to enter the top 10 to the album.
Rating: three stars
Duran Duran- Medazzaland (1997): Tripphop and Industrial influences
The album title alludes to the Midalozam medication, which Simon Le Bon receives in a tooth operation. And Duran Duran really seem to be in the sedated Medazzaland: The industrial and tripphop-influenced songs sound as if the band had false memories of massive attack and nine inch nails. Bassist John Taylor recognizes the signs of time and still acknowledges the service during the recordings. The publication strategy shows how little even your record company believes in the success of the album. For the time being, Medazzaland appears exclusively in North America, Latin America and Japan.
Evaluation: two and a half stars
Lame Boys
Duran Duran-Notorious (1986): Nile Rodgers and the radio rock sound
With the aim of achieving a certain musical maturity, Duran Duran prescribe a change of direction on her fourth album. What worked out on the album is already working on the hitsingles “The Wild Boys” and “View to a Kill”. The band wants to get away from the synth pop towards a raweren, contemporary sound. To do this, they hire Nile Rodgers (Chic) as a producer who has already transferred Diana Ross and David Bowie into modern times. But apart from the title song, not much of this album remains. What use is the most dazzling 80s radio rock production if the songs are not good?
Rating: two stars
Duran Duran – Liberty (1990): Disassembly in the 90s
Is a band that is so successful in a decade and whose sound has decisively shaped, is afraid of the beginning of the next? Because pop culture is relentless in falling old heroes? Liberty is Duran Duran’s sixth album and her first in the 1990s. And as to confirm the fear thesis, the band is lost in a dense undergrowth of very different musical banalities: Power Pop on the border to the hit, sterilized soul, radio rock. And not a single song on Liberty is so strong and memorable that he would wear the imposed arrangements.
Evaluation: one and a half stars
Duran Duran – Thank You (1995): Controversial cover album
In the deep nineties dilemma: On Thank you covers Duran Duran Songs, which you have influenced according to your own statements. “Thank you” comes from Led Zeppelin, plus Sly & The Family Stone, Lou Reed, Bob Dylan, Iggy Pop and The Doors. The English “Q” magazine is choosing Thanks to the worst album ever. It’s not that bad. Nevertheless: no thanks.