{"id":44,"date":"2011-03-17T12:50:55","date_gmt":"2011-03-17T20:50:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/?p=44"},"modified":"2023-03-09T15:57:15","modified_gmt":"2023-03-09T23:57:15","slug":"duranalysis-wild-boys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/duranalysis-wild-boys\/","title":{"rendered":"Duranalysis: The Wild Boys"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

They tried to break us; looks like they\u2019ll try again\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s Duranalyze some classic Duran Duran music videos, shall we? I see no benefit to going chronologically, so first up is 1984’s \u201cThe Wild Boys,\u201d because it\u2019s both my favorite Duran Duran song and my favorite Duran Duran video. Before I launch into the analysis, though, for the benefit of any neophytes, here\u2019s a quick rundown of the beautiful boys of Duran Duran:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simon Le Bon<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"Duranalysis<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Vocalist, bon vivant<\/em>, rapscallion, flirt. I\u2019d like to take this opportunity to thank Simon for penning some of most of the evocative\/ confounding \/nonsensical \/awesome pop lyrics of all time; honestly, I don\u2019t know how many e-mails I\u2019ve fired off using the subject header, \u201cYour telephone\u2019s been ringing while you\u2019re dancing in the rain.\u201d Ditto for, \u201cCherry ice-cream smile, I suppose it\u2019s very nice.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

John Taylor<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"John<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Bass guitarist, all-purpose heartthrob. Tall, willowy and lovely, John is the most classically handsome of the bunch (now there\u2019s<\/em> a statement designed to spark conflict\u2014yes, boys, you\u2019re all very pretty; I\u2019m just giving a slight edge to John and his stellar bone structure). If we gauge the popularity of the individual band members strictly based on the total number of glossy centerfolds in my stack of era-appropriate BOP and Tiger Beat magazines (which I\u2019m pretty sure<\/em> is the most accurate and scientific way of doing this), John wins by a healthy margin. Can\u2019t be certain, but there might be some odd correlation between John\u2019s staggering beauty and his wild popularity.  Seems like a genuinely cool, sweet-natured guy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Nick Rhodes<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"Nick<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Keyboardist, enfant terrible<\/em>, magical pixie. Ah, Nick. I love all the Durans; I adore Nick. The youngest and strangest Duran, Nick is a baby ocelot set loose in a basket of kittens. The mere sight of Nick\u2014lovely, fussy Nick, Nick of the heavy makeup and the ever-changing hairstyles\u2014always fills me with giddy delight. Here\u2019s an awkward and gloriously vapid bit<\/a> from Nick\u2019s appearance on a 1985 episode of MTV\u2019s Andy Warhol\u2019s Fifteen Minutes<\/em>. If someone distilled all the wonderful bizarreness of the pop-culture scene of the first half of the eighties into a single moment, the result might be this clip, in which an enchanted Warhol, Nick\u2019s longtime mentor and friend, gazes upon the splendor of Nick and murmurs wistfully, \u201cYou look so beautiful in this light.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Andy Taylor<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"Andy<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Guitarist, troublemaker. A rock-and-roll man who somehow ended up in a glamorous pop band, Andy has quit the group more than once and is the only one of the original lineup not presently affiliated with Duran Duran in any way. In 2008, Andy published a memoir, Wild Boy: My Life in Duran Duran<\/a><\/em>, in which he takes pains not to burn too<\/em> many bridges (by Andy\u2019s account, apart from a little wholly unsurprising recreational drug usage, the boys were a suspiciously well-behaved bunch during their heyday), yet which still manages to be pretty darn entertaining. In his book, Andy stops just short of spelling out how much he despises Nick\u2019s enchanting magical-pixie guts, but the message comes across nonetheless. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Roger Taylor<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n
\n
\"Roger<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Drummer, enigma. Roger has a well-documented aversion to fame and attention (somewhere out there, Simon and Nick are blinking adorably in confusion at this concept). Like Andy, Roger has quit the band a time or two in the past, though he\u2019s currently an active member. Seems like a nice chap. Smoking hot, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

The video for \u201cThe Wild Boys\u201d came out in 1984 and was directed by Russell Mulcahy, who, in addition to helming the (awesome) first Highlander<\/em> film, also directed a slew of Duran Duran\u2019s iconic early videos\u2014\u201cRio,\u201d \u201cHungry Like The Wolf,\u201d \u201cSave a Prayer,\u201d and so forth. Mulcahy optioned the rights to William S. Burroughs\u2019s scattered, feverish, sleazy dystopian novel, The Wild Boys: A Book of the Dead<\/em>, with an eye toward making it into a movie, then asked the band to write an appropriate song for it. The lavish, expensive, no-holds-barred video was meant to serve as something of a teaser for the prospective movie, which never came to fruition. But the video endures, and it\u2019s a doozy, in the best possible way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Opening scenes: Flame-spitting uniformed schoolboys destroy an abandoned schoolroom, and a creepy animatronic head (which also spits flames–we\u2019re in for a surprising amount of flame-spitting here) watches a video of Duran Duran performing.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

(Digression, which I’ve added a decade or so after originally writing this piece: I have more–much more–to say about that animatronic head in my Duranalysis of the band’s gonzo sci-fi themed concert film Arena: An Absurd Notion<\/em>, including some unproven but pretty well-substantiated theories as to which actor’s very famous noggin served as the basis for it; you should check out what I have to say about it there<\/a>, but in short: yes, absolutely, 100% no fooling, it was Patrick Stewart.)<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Duran<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Meanwhile, in what looks like a vast, run-down underground fortress (there\u2019s a pyramid, and scaffolding, and cliffs, and platforms, and a freaking lagoon\u2026 it\u2019s all kind of epic and overwhelming), a bunch of loincloth-and-feather-clad men dance around in an ecstatic frenzy. Lots of high kicks and balletic leaps. Which, given the loincloths, is certainly attention-getting.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Also? Some of the men appear to be mutants. We\u2019re in post-apocalyptic territory here. Just go with it.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

And here\u2019s Simon: He\u2019s clad in leather and is strapped to a gigantic rickety spinning windmill. On every rotation, poor Simon\u2019s head gets dunked in the lagoon. Trooper that he is, he keeps on singing all the while. Not just singing\u2014he\u2019s full-on rocking out, gesticulating wildly with his arms and throwing his head back and wriggling his hips. Simon is not a man to do things in half-measures. He commits.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Nick, meanwhile, is trapped in a cage in the middle of the chamber. Heh. Nick. For this video, all the boys are wearing distressed leather outfits, Mad Max<\/em>-style, to look appropriately battered and war-torn and post-apocalyptic. Nick\u2019s outfit, however, is the only one that\u2019s covered with shiny jewels.<\/em> Why, yes, there is<\/em> behind-the-scenes footage<\/a> of wee dainty Nick, happy as a strangely glamorous clam while looking even more Muppetty than usual, taking the initiative to glue sparkly baubles all over his costume, which he had deemed insufficiently fabulous. Nick, you\u2019re a living treasure.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

(Digression: Thus far, I\u2019ve been proceeding under the assumption that anyone interested enough to read this already possesses at least a working knowledge of Duran Duran. Hence, I haven\u2019t bothered dredging up the usual factoids\u2014John Taylor and Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor are totally unrelated to each other! The band was formed by childhood friends Nick and John in Birmingham, UK, in 1978! They took the band name from a character in Roger Vadim\u2019s 1968 delightfully tawdry sci-fi film Barbarella<\/em>!\u2014because I figure it\u2019s old news. But just in case anyone is diving in here without knowing the vast and storied history of Duran Duran\u2026 Nick is straight. He was married to a model, Julie Anne Rhodes, n\u00e9e Friedman, at the time this video came out, and has been romantically linked to a series of extremely beautiful women over the years. I point this out only because: a) this is maybe not immediately apparent upon one\u2019s first visit to Planet Nick, and b) Nick\u2019s gender-fluid appearance touches on some fascinating and optimistic things about the growing uselessness of gender boundaries: So we have this androgynous sylph who\u2019s attracted to women but who gravitates toward some traits that have been arbitrarily classified as feminine\u2014the hair, the makeup, the love of fashion and sparkly things\u2014and who\u2019s comfortable enough in his own skin to plant himself squarely on the gender line in a large-scale public manner. Obviously he\u2019s not the first to try this\u2014just look at Bowie, or a slew of other artists like Boy George, and hell, all five Durans wore their share of makeup during this time\u2014but it\u2019s hard to think of another public figure who took it to Nick\u2019s level in the early 1980s. Short version of all that: I think Nick is cool as hell. Also? Total chick magnet.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enough with the digression. Back to the Durans in peril!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So Nick\u2019s stuck in a cage, where he\u2019s fretting sexily while fiddling around with a pile of electronic equipment. One of the feral mutant lads scuttles up to him and secretly passes what looks like a metal disk to him through the bars.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Piecing together these little scraps of information and making some crazy deductive leaps, I\u2019m guessing the mutant is an ally who\u2019s helping Nick build something to facilitate an escape. I can\u2019t really speak to Nick\u2019s electrical know-how or mechanical prowess, but my gut feeling is that if you\u2019re being held captive in an underground fortress by a feral band of mutants and your best chance of escape hinges upon Nick Rhodes spot-welding a circuit board\u2026 you\u2019re screwed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am, of course, extrapolating wildly from the miniscule snippets of information we\u2019re given and drawing conclusions that may be totally off-base. It\u2019s also entirely possible the mutant dude just scuttled up and handed the pretty caged boy a cookie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s check in with John: He\u2019s strapped down across the hood of a car, forced to stare up at a television monitor, which is broadcasting images of\u2026 his own beautiful face. The inhuman fiends! Such torment! John writhes and writhes against his bonds. Writhe, John! Writhe!<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Yeah. This is a really good video.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

It\u2019s pretty much unapologetic fetish fuel, start to finish: You\u2019ve got these loincloth-wearing feral mutants who have bound or caged our boys and are keeping them around for some unspecified but no doubt unsavory purpose. Given the source material, sex is an entirely reasonable guess (raise your hand if you\u2019ve ever hacked your way through any Burroughs novel, The Wild Boys<\/em> very much included. I\u2019m pretty much spot on, yes?).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or, getting my mind out of the gutter, maybe the feral mutants just needed a house band.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More high kicks in loincloths! One of the mutants catapults himself over Nick\u2019s cage, which causes Nick to fret sexily some more. There\u2019s also some guy flying around the chamber on makeshift wings. Naturally.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Simon wriggles his way free of the windmill and splashes around in the lagoon, which turns out to be populated by sharp-toothed mutant albino fish, one of which tries to chew his face off. Simon is not daunted. It takes more than toothy mutant fish to keep Simon Le Bon down.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Duranalysis<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

At this point, the video remembers there are a couple of other band members whom we haven\u2019t yet seen: Andy is bound high up on the scaffolding, clutching his guitar, kicking at some of the mutants who keep grabbing at his legs.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

For his part, Roger is floating up near the ceiling of the chamber in his own little hot-air balloon, and this is the point where I realize it\u2019s a sucker\u2019s game to try to impose too much logical structure onto a Duran Duran video. It\u2019s like trying to explain a dream to someone, where you end up having to make up details to bridge gaps in logic to have it make any kind of coherent sense. Roger\u2019s dangling from a hot-air balloon. Just\u2026 go with it. Let the video wash over you. Just stare at those pretty English boys in their cute leather outfits and stop trying to beat it into a traditional narrative framework.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Simon makes his way to land, then reaches a hand up to an unseen figure. Andy? Maybe Roger?<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

And then we rather abruptly cut to a ticker tape parade, in which all of Duran Duran drive victoriously through the now-empty chamber, having apparently escaped from their bonds and vanquished the loincloth-garbed mutants in some part of the video we didn\u2019t get to see.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Wild<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u2026the hell?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I get it: It\u2019s a music video, not a movie, and the focus is on presenting a series of evocative images, not having everything make perfect sense. Still, I can\u2019t help feeling like we\u2019ve been cheated out of some awesome epic battle scenes. There\u2019s not a lot I wouldn\u2019t give for just a few precious seconds of seeing Nick locked in mortal combat with a feral mutant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s an extended version of this video, which includes another three minutes of footage, but\u2026 look, I\u2019ve already written over two thousand words on a four-minute video, which I think is plenty, so I\u2019m going to gloss over the rest. The extended version factors into Arena (An Absurd Notion)<\/em>, Duran Duran\u2019s 1984 concert video, in which concert footage is bridged together with a framing device involving the band\u2019s namesake, Milo O\u2019Shea\u2019s Durand Durand character from Barbarella<\/em>. The long version features more high-kicking dance numbers, some bare breasts (there\u2019s a Wild Girl or two amongst the feral boys in this version), some special effects that have not withstood the stampede of technical progress, and more footage of Simon strapped to the damn windmill. Simon is an awesome force of nature, and he\u2019s got charisma and energy seeping out of his pores; he takes the lead in pretty much every single video, as he absolutely should, but here\u2019s something no one has ever needed to say about a Duran Duran video: \u201cI think that needed more Simon.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anyway. It\u2019s a fabulous project, start to finish, chock full of fantastic images. As a lifelong sucker for any well-depicted dystopian hellscape, I love the idea of stranding an improbable party in a nightmarish post-apocalyptic wasteland and seeing how well they\u2019d fare. In the case of Duran Duran? They fared pretty damn well.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

They tried to break us; looks like they\u2019ll try again\u2026 Let\u2019s Duranalyze some classic Duran Duran music videos, shall we? I see no benefit to going chronologically, so […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-duran-duran"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1657,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions\/1657"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/morganrichter.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}