This one's for Mike Patterson:
Mike, you wrote the other day that the new album was "shaping up one of [your] all-time favorite Duran Duran albums". That's good news. However, it would be good to know which one is your all-time favorite. Just to get an impression which direction the albums going.
I mean, theres a huge difference between "Big Thing" and "Rio" not to mention Wedding Album and Duran Duran, which probably are the four most critically acclaimed albums.
Kasper
"Without a doubt it would be Duran Duran. The reissue would be the version that first introduced me to the band.
One of my favorite songs of all time is Careless Memories. I like the tempo, attitude and darkness of it.
If I like an artist that is a full band and not a solo artist, I usually find that their first album my favorite.
They have been playing the songs for a year or so and they just got a record deal so there is a excitement to the music that is not usually there on the following albums.
That excitement is what I found when I went to San Francisco to work with Duran Duran. They had been on the road playing together for two years straight so they were super tight. They may have not walked in with a ton of songs written but once there the songs pored out of them.
Keep in mind that the sound of my favorite album has no influence at all on the sound of this album. Anyone who is looking for Rio Part 2 should go out and by the Clear Static record. This record was made by the same guys who made the albums you love but they have been through this crazy thing called life since then. They are amazingly well versed on new music and popular culture but we have made this record with no thought towards that. This record is about what is going on in their world and the world around them, and the music is a reaction to their feelings towards it. The music reflects that.
We never made a conscious effort to sound like the old records. If there are moments where it does, it is just because it is the same guys doing what they do best.
The better question to have asked me would have been do I prefer Arcadia or The Power Station.
That question is for me to know and you to find out.
MP"
