Duran Duran Still Bringing It After 30 Years

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Duran Duran Still Bringing It After 30 Years
The Concert Takes Us On A Trip Around A Not-So-Ordinary World
Thursday, October 13th, 2011 at 3:20 pm | Miranda Peterson

After 14 albums and over three decades together, Duran Duran might as well have been a living display from the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino’s legendary collection of music paraphernalia. The band has changed and aged over the years, but the same sprightly spirit has remained with Simon, Nick, John and Roger.

Four giant, ghostly white masks hung high above a stage spotlighted a dark shade of blue. The crowd erupted as the house lights dimmed and the band emerged. The boys blasted off to outer space with their first single circa 1981, Planet Earth. Flashing lights resembled the launching of a spaceship and the band performed to a backdrop of stars whizzing by at light speed.

We were treated to the title track off their latest album, All You Need Is Now, which seemed to have an unusually edgier and grittier sound. Contrarily, the first single from said album is Leave a Light On, which Simon described as a “song about the person who brings you back from the edge when you’re close to it.”

Later, we splashed down beneath the waves for their poignant chart topper, Come Undone. On stage, underwater scenes reminiscent of the music video were spliced with live footage. We also seemed to have a brief stint in the Land of Oz for The Reflex. The “floating” white masks suddenly had features as they mouthed the lyrics and sunglasses and masks flickered across their giant faces.

The energy was almost tangible as we traveled back in time to the 80’s and a mostly-middle-aged crowd relived their glory days, swaying to the sounds of Ordinary World and rocking out to Notorious. Fans were left howling for more when the guys walked off the stage after playing Hungry Like The Wolf and Sunrise. Of course they came back out for an encore and the applause of the audience rivaled the thunderous percussion of Wild Boys. The final song of the night was Rio, which had everyone singing and dancing right up until their frontman signed off by saying “Thanks for coming out tonight and we’ll see you down the road.”

One lucky guy won a pair of tickets to the show courtesy of Joonbug, after submitting a sincere story about wanting to surprise a friend who is a big fan of the band and currently down on his own luck.

My best friend has been having a really horrible week and I think this would be a great surprise to really cheer him up. Duran Duran is one of his 3 favorite bands of all time - he even made me watch Barbarella so I would get the reference for the band name. He's staying at my house tomorrow night as his car is broken down and this would be an amazing last second surprise as my house is very near the show. I'd love the show and would love to know it made someone else's day too.

And what did they think of the show? Although there was soggy weather and we had a rough day it was all forgotten once we got to the Duran Duran show. They've got the type of sound you only get when you've been playing together for 30+ years. They're not self conscious, they play tight as a unit, and they were having a ton of fun which made it really fun for us. Brilliant night - wish it didn't have to end.

Courtesy Joonbug