Showtime's 'Duran Duran: There's Something You Should Know' packs an impressive take on the iconic band's legacy
The Showtime network just aired a documentary on one of the most beloved music groups of the 1980s, Duran Duran, who were globally renowned for their stylish pop songs and groundbreaking music videos during the MTV era.
The 60-minute feature takes a candid, retrospective look at the band's much-lauded discography, complete with an engaging interview with the original lineup from the 1980s.
The film not only highlights the defining moments of Duran Duran's four decades-long journey but also provides a glimpse into what the future might hold for the members of the band.
The very first shot of the Showtime documentary shows Duran Duran vocalist Simon Le Bon driving a car and quoting a line made famous by The Stone Roses.
Explaining that he knew what he wanted to be when he grew up, Le Bon quipped that he "wanted to be adored". And adored they certainly were, as 80 million records sold is no mean feat.
Duran Duran's self-titled debut album in 1981 was their gameplan, their manifesto — they were passionate, driven kids from Hollywood, Birmingham, looking to escape their humble beginnings by playing the very best music that they could play, "every note they knew".
They believed in strong melodies and good songs, it was as simple as that. They also had a Citroen as their first tour car, believe it or not! And they all became close friends and brothers along the way too.
Roger Taylor revealed that Birmingham was pretty small in those days, so when Nick Rhodes and John Taylor heard about his drumming prowess, he was invited to jam with them in Cheapside, Birmingham.
The initial jams went well, and so Roger left his manual labor job to join the group full-time. The band members all used to frequent (and work at) the Rum Runner Club in Birmingham, which is where they would eventually meet guitarist Andy Taylor and vocalist Simon Le Bon.
The band remembers being blown away by Le Bon's choirboy voice and his book of lyrics, in a time when words were "the gold dust of the music business". Le Bon was invited to join the band, which completed the original classic line-up.
And the rest is history. Duran Duran's debut album went platinum and remained on the UK Top 100 charts for 117 weeks.
When they first started tasting success as a band together, they admitted they wanted to take over the world. And why wouldn't they? Duran Duran featured talented, photogenic young men in their prime who had similar tastes in music, fashion and girls.
Multiple celebrity fans of the band also feature in the film, such as supermodel Cindy Crawford, who said, "What teenage girl didn't have a crush on every single guy in the band?"
Another supermodel, Naomi Campbell, confirmed that Duran Duran was "her life" and that she once waited outside the BBC for them as a young love-struck girl, but they "never noticed me".
The band themselves confirmed that they got (and enjoyed) a lot of attention from women, with Roger Taylor stating that whenever they tried to move, there were "200 teenage girls trying to rip them apart."
Popstar Boy George also made an appearance, saying that having the career that Duran Duran had managed to obtain was "the ultimate dream."
'There's Something You Should Know' is, naturally, sprinkled with Duran Duran's signature new wave pop music, but it contains more than just the exotic music video hits that they were famous for.
There is one particularly brilliant, stirring performance of 'Save a Prayer' by Le Bon and Andy Taylor that showcases just how naturally gifted this band actually was.
By now, with their status of pop idols newly conferred and confirmed, Duran Duran had become "objects of desire". They started getting invited to exclusive parties, where they got to rub shoulders with celebrities.
By the time the album 'Rio' came along in 1982, EMI in the UK had started promoting Duran Duran as a New Romantic band, but they were yet to crack the United States. That all changed when they got their 'Rio' remixed by David Kershenbaum, and started promoting it as their dance album.
Suddenly, they were gathering momentum in the States as well, and had started to become famous worldwide.
Duran Duran gained even more traction and exposure when they started doing their grand, cinematic, stylish music videos, often set in exotic locales — MTV would play them on heavy rotation, and the tactic paid off — 'Rio' went double platinum that year.
In 1983, 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger' was released, and by now it was becoming harder and harder for the band to maintain a sense of normalcy anymore.
By the time 'Arena' and 'Notorious' came along, it had all gotten rather too much towards the end — several members had developed significant substance abuse issues by then as well, and Nick Rhodes remembers that the demands made on them as a band had become "just absurd".
Eventually, the band just felt like rats spinning on a wheel for people who had sniffed out their cash cow potential. Having been in demand for so long at first and then gradually to not have anyone interested in you at all is a rather bitter pill to swallow.
Still, while Duran Duran's most prolific years might have been in the early '80s, the group's longest-running tour would be for the 'Astronaut' album in the mid-2000s — plus they enjoyed a brief revival when they entered the Top 10 in 1993 with 'Duran Duran' and again in 2015 with 'Paper Gods'.
However, it was those glorious years at the start of their career that everyone looks back to with a lot of relish and nostalgia. Duran Duran was certainly a cut above the rest.
'Duran Duran: There's Something You Should Know' originally aired on the Showtime network at 9 PM ET.