Before the month is over, I wanted to explain (or blather) about December 2007’s color theme which is based upon Duran Duran’s second album Rio. Not only was it their breakthrough record in the US, it is their best Astronaut, Big Thing and Duran Duran (1981) are very close.
It’s not because the hits “Hungry like the Wolf,” “Rio,” “Save a Prayer” and “The Chauffeur” are on it. Nah, it signifies when Houston’s influences were starting to take a hold on me, musically and mentally. I wouldn’t realize this until 1983, after a party with my former St. Agnes classmates.
In 1982, Houston was one of the first few cities to have MTV so I saw the video “Hungry like the Wolf” pretty early. The VJs ranted and raved over it. Originally, I was more puzzled. It looked like some UK New Wave band imitating Indiana Jones. The song was catchy and infectious though. Then Rock station KLOL began playing it, this gave it more legitimacy to an audience still lamenting over the loss of Led Zeppelin, Skynyrd and the Eagles. Later I had the good fortune of a friend named Brent loaning me his copy. From the intriguing Nagel illustration on the cover to the band pictures and liner notes, I definitely couldn’t wait to get home to play this with the headset on. That first side of Rio was amazing! I especially continue to enjoy John Taylor’s pronounced bass on “My Own Way,” it was also an appropriate anthem at 14. The other side’s tracks connected regardless of them being slow and/or melodramatic. Definitely an all killer, no filler album. When MTV selected them to be one of the four bands to perform at their second New Year’s Eve Bash, I had to see this. Oddly, my family went to bed before midnight and I had to keep the volume down while they played live for the Central Time Zone’s festivities. Their performance was pretty impressive but I was already a fan, I really wanted to see them in concert (which I’ve now done three times).
Oh I was still a miserable pain in the ass with my parents over living in Houston and being uprooted from the life I had known in Springfield, IL for some months to follow. However, Duran Duran’s music, energy and look definitely put the gears in motion toward changing my attitude toward many things. It led to me also getting into music by Adam Ant, the Fixx, Split Enz, Berlin and INXS. Indirectly, it turned me into big-city dweller, preferably the metropolises of America because bands such as Duran Duran didn’t play anywhere else. This did lead me to enjoying the other benefits of large cities eventually.