Post by ©DURANMANIA Board Team on Dec 20, 2005 22:17:51 GMT -5
Duran Duran
MUSIC REVIEW
FIONA SHEPHERD
DURAN Duran, as any thirtysomething woman will tell you, were the last of the non-manufactured boy bands, 80s teenybop behemoths with credibility. So where, 20 years on, have all the male fans suddenly sprung from? With the danger of getting beaten up in the school corridor for digging a girls' band having passed, thousands of closet New Romantics converged at the feet of a group who are choosy with their setlist but still canny with their visuals.
If anything, the quintet looked better than ever, clad in classic black suits and ties. You could never accuse Duran Duran of trading lazily on a nostalgia ticket.
Instead, they began with Friends Of Mine, an album track from the earliest days, and gave as much weight to later, less stratospheric hits such as Skin Trade as they did to Save A Prayer or The Reflex.
There were contentious omissions too - no Hungry Like The Wolf or Is There Something I Should Know? - yet the show still clocked in at over two hours of energetic stadium pop, during which keyboard player Nick Rhodes didn't so much as loosen his tie. Now that's dedication to the art of pop.
MUSIC REVIEW
FIONA SHEPHERD
DURAN Duran, as any thirtysomething woman will tell you, were the last of the non-manufactured boy bands, 80s teenybop behemoths with credibility. So where, 20 years on, have all the male fans suddenly sprung from? With the danger of getting beaten up in the school corridor for digging a girls' band having passed, thousands of closet New Romantics converged at the feet of a group who are choosy with their setlist but still canny with their visuals.
If anything, the quintet looked better than ever, clad in classic black suits and ties. You could never accuse Duran Duran of trading lazily on a nostalgia ticket.
Instead, they began with Friends Of Mine, an album track from the earliest days, and gave as much weight to later, less stratospheric hits such as Skin Trade as they did to Save A Prayer or The Reflex.
There were contentious omissions too - no Hungry Like The Wolf or Is There Something I Should Know? - yet the show still clocked in at over two hours of energetic stadium pop, during which keyboard player Nick Rhodes didn't so much as loosen his tie. Now that's dedication to the art of pop.