If ever a band has earned their longevity, then that band is Duran Duran. Initially rising to prominence during the UK’s short-lived but influential New Romantic movement of the early 80s, the group have sampled the highest highs, but they’ve also endured plenty of lows during an extraordinary career which has so far yielded record sales of over 100 million and stretched into five decades.
The band’s initial phase was the stuff pop star dreams are made of, with their first three albums and a seemingly unstoppable slew of hits, among them Girls On Film, Hungry Like The Wolf, Save A Prayer, Rio and The Reflex, raking in multi-million sales with help from some glossy yet iconic promo videos that scored heavy rotation on the nascent MTV. The group suffered through leaner times due to personnel reshuffles and changing trends during the late 80s and 90s, but Duran Duran are nothing if not resilient. They reacquainted themselves with the UK Top 5 with 2004’s Astronauts, and they’ve been there or thereabouts ever since. 2021’s Future Past received some of the best reviews of their career, and their recent induction into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame acknowledges that modern music would have been far poorer without Duran Duran’s colossal contribution.