Skeeter's Duran Duran Fan Page

I remember when the band broke through American commercial radio in 1982. I would have been hiding in the basement from the summer sun, tinkering with my model trains or drawing pictures, with a radio next to me. Hungry Like the Wolf was their first major single in the states. If you were the kind of kid to record songs off the radio, you waited for the long version because it was just amazing.

MTV was gaining steam and we thought it was the best thing. Duran Duran had videos to songs that you never heard on the radio... Girls on Film and Save A Prayer were probably the most notable ones. They felt like a look into a world that was bigger that what was on the surface.

Anyhow, fast forward to 1984 and Duran Duran were everywhere. I mean... EVERYWHERE. On TV, on the radio, on newsstands, in t-shirt shops, you name it, they were everywhere. Any modest fan had at least a record, a magazine, and a handful of buttons on their jean jacket. The Seven and The Ragged Tiger era is sometimes considered both their peak and also not their best, but for me, it was this period that sealed the deal for me. New Moon on Monday was the one you sang to, and The Reflex was THE banger.

The band entered a wobbly period between The Wild Boys and Live Aid, splitting into The Power Station and Arcadia. I was definitely in Camp Arcadia. I mean, Arcadia was Goth before there was Goth. Or I should say, "urban upscale goth" which nobody was doing at the time. The entire project was a masterclass in merging music, aesthetic, and graphic design into one collective product.

When the band regrouped for the Notorious era, it felt like the end of a drought, but also the end of their classic era. Hindsight puts Notorious and Big Thing firmly in the classic period, if not a transitional one that led to The Wedding Album.

I followed the band religiously right up until Paper Gods. The last few releases have been good, but I miss the time when you could walk into a record shop on/around release day and get their CD and open a new experience. In the digital age, releases are teased for a long time, and in the case of Danse Macabre, dragged out over a period of months. Still fun, but not the same level of day one reveal.

I will always love this band. They were the soundtrack of my youth, a guiding voice through my formative years, and a grand lesson in perserverance.

Coming soon: favorite records, favorite books, maybe some buttons too!