Duran Duran: Birmingham, Video and the Second British Invasion

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Synth-Pop · New Wave

Birmingham, video and the Second British Invasion.

Duran Duran performing together on stage in Verona, Italy, in 2005, beneath three tall red light panels.
Duran Duran performing together on stage in Verona, Italy, in 2005, beneath three tall red light panels. Photo: GothEric, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0. Source.
The Welsh Congregational Church on Loveday Street, Birmingham.
The Welsh Congregational Church on Loveday Street, Birmingham, the band’s home city. Photo: Hassocks5489, Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0. Source · CC0. Display resized; no retouching.

The biography

Duran Duran is an English band formed in Birmingham in 1978, named after a character in the film Barbarella (1968). Their first album, Duran Duran (1981), brought “Planet Earth” and “Girls on Film.” The breakthrough came with Rio (1982), with “Hungry Like the Wolf,” “Save a Prayer” and “Rio,” and with cinematic videos that helped the group become famous in America through MTV. The peak continued with “The Reflex” (1984) and the James Bond film song “A View to a Kill” (1985).

A coastal view at sunset in Sukosan, with a yacht-shaped cloud.
A coastal view at sunset in Sukosan, with a yacht-shaped cloud. Photo: otrow_photography, Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0. Source · CC0. Display resized; no retouching.

Duran Duran represents the “Second British Invasion” and the MTV era: synth-pop, visual style and video as a central part of a band’s identity. Their music is bright, rhythmic and romantic, and their videos — shot like short films in exotic locations — made them as much a visual band as a musical one.

Listening observations are original Past Tunes interpretation. Photographs reproduced under the reuse terms shown in their captions.

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