Duran Duran 'Ordinary World (single version)'

Chart Peak: 6
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'Ordinary World', which made No. 6 in February '93, was the group's biggest hit British single hit since 1985... This epic ballad was also a huge American success.

Start of Disc 2 is a song that mentions a Thursday - and I'm posting on Thursday! It's almost like I planned it or something (I didn't).

'Ordinary World' is a song that confused me a bit in the 1990s because I found myself quite liking it. It's a smooth, melodic-sounding number with a slick production (admittedly slightly dated now, but it was pretty good at the time) and importantly a sadness that gives it a weight most Duran music lacks. Apparently the song is actually about a deceased friend of Simon Le Bon, although I'm not sure whether that was widely-known at the time. Unfortunately, the song has in retrospect become a little over-burdened by the band's own insistence that it's their best work, as part of their insistent campaign that they're not just an Eighties band, etc. Good as the song is, that's a bit too much of a burden for it. Still, they're right to be proud of it, and it is true that the song effectively relaunched their career, at least until they wrecked it again with the dodgy covers album a couple of years later.

Also appearing on: Now 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 14, 25, 31
Available on: Duran Duran [The Wedding Album]

Duran Duran 'Notorious'

Starting a new album again here, so as a slight experiment I'm putting this part before any details of the track itself. Now 8 seems a logical enough way to follow Now 38, especially as it's the only one of the first 10 I haven't already done. Fitting in with my album-every-two-months schedule means that the short month of February is a good time to do the shorter 1980s albums. Besides, there are some real gems and a few surprises on here. Now 8 is also notable as the second album in the series to come out on CD, albeit again in a truncated single-disc version. Unlike the Now 4 compact disc, though, the Now 8 CD was drawn entirely from the vinyl and cassette versions so I have tagged the crossover tracks. As you may see from the image accompanying this post, my own copy of the album isn't in the best of condition but it's good enough and all sleevenotes are intact, so let's get going...

Chart Peak: 7
YouTube

Roared into the chart at No. 14 on 28th October after just one week on release.

Because we're in the era when there were only two Now albums a year (1985-7), it's less obvious than it might have been that Duran Duran were on a bit of a hiatus in the middle of the decade, save for the one-off James Bond theme 'A View To A Kill' on Now 5. 'Notorious' and the parent album of the same name marked their resumption, although by the time the record was finished they were two Taylors short with Roger Taylor in retirement and Andy Taylor estranged: he grudgingly took part in some recording sessions but left amid much acrimony. Some reports have it that he tried to stop the remaining trio using the group name, which would perhaps explain why the single and album covers just say "Duran Notorious". They were able to retain the services of Nile Rodgers as producer and guitarist for these sessions, which should in theory have been a good fit for the funk direction they were aiming at but as usual there's something profoundly unfunky about Duran. Maybe this track suffers particularly from the protracted recording sessions but it feels like there's a fundamental tension between the desire for a smoothly metronomic sound and the human element needed to give the track drive. The hip-hop-influenced repetitions of the title in the chorus certainly stick in the mind but unfortunately they always sound better in my memory than in the finished track. The song is apparently supposed to be quite a bitter one (the "flaky bandit" mentioned in the lyric is supposedly Andy Taylor) but the anger comes through no more convincingly than the funk. I don't want to sound like I have some anti-Duran bias but I've not really enjoyed any of their Now appearances yet, it somehow keeps feeling like a chore.

Also appearing on: Now 1, 2, 3, 5, 13, 14 24, 25, 31
Available on: Notorious

Arcadia 'Election Day'

Chart Peak: 7

YouTube

Simon Le Bon, Roger Taylor and Nick Rhodes from Duran Duran are Arcadia. They had raced to No. 7 by 29th October with 'Election Day' their first single.

A product of the split within Duran Duran that also produced The Power Station, Arcadia were the more obviously related act (so much so that even I noticed) because they had the lead singer. Musically, they seemed closer to Duran territory too, sparing us the ham-fisted attempts and funk and hard rock that the Power Station delivered, concentrating instead on the more electronic sounds of the parent act. Simon le Bon once described their sole album as the most pretentious ever made, which is unlikely to be true, but presumably indicates that they were giving freer reign to ideas that wouldn't have been so welcome in the parent band. However, lacking the time or inclination to listen to the whole thing, I can only say that 'Election Day' itself doesn't sound a lot more pretentious than many Duran Duran songs; presumably it was chosen as lead single for that very reason, to avoid alienating their teenybopper fans. Le Bon sings a load of incomprehensible images through his nose, Rhodes plays lots of overdubbed keyboard parts and Taylor is presumably drumming somewhere in the mix, although he's not in the video. The only surprise is when Grace Jones turns up to deliver a speech towards the end. She's not in the video.

Apparently this song makes little sense even to people who like it, and doesn't seem to have appealed far beyond the Durannies, which arguably makes it a little out of place here.

Available on: So Red The Rose