walking upstream…
Duran Duran
sourcesWikipedia · The Electricity Club · DuranDuran.com
Duran Duran formed in Birmingham in 1978 around keyboardist Nick Rhodes and bassist John Taylor, who wanted a band that fused the raw energy of the Sex Pistols with Chic's dancefloor discipline and the sculpted glamour of Bowie and Roxy Music. The classic lineup — Simon Le Bon, Andy Taylor, and Roger Taylor completing the five in 1980 — became the definitive New Romantic pop group, all cheekbones, synthesizers, and location-shoot music videos built for the new medium of MTV. 'Planet Earth,' 'Girls on Film,' and 'Rio' turned art-school pretension into stadium-filling hits, and 1986's Nile Rodgers-produced 'Notorious' brought the Chic influence full circle. Four decades on they remain active, still touring the same restless, tuxedoed synth-pop blueprint.
the sound in question
1982
RioDuran Duran
walk the tributaries ↓
Chic1970s · Disco / Funk / R&B
John Taylor has said that when he took up the bass, 'the two biggest influences were Chic and David Bowie's rhythm section from the Station to Station album' — Chic gave him and drummer Roger Taylor a shared vocabulary of clipped, funky basslines built to move a dancefloor rather than just anchor a song. That mission statement to fuse discofied groove with rock and glam ran through the band from its 1978 formation, and came full circle in 1986 when Chic's Nile Rodgers produced Duran Duran's 'Notorious' outright.
listen: upstream & here
1979
Good TimesChic
1986
NotoriousDuran Duran
listen forCue up 'Good Times' next to 'Notorious' — both ride a springy, syncopated bassline pushed right to the front of the mix, disco's four-on-the-floor confidence reimagined as mid-'80s dance-rock, with Rodgers's own guitar chatter audible on the later track.
David Bowie1970s · Art rock / Glam rock
John Taylor named Bowie's 'Station to Station' rhythm section as one of his two founding bass influences, singling out the song 'Stay' as what he and Roger Taylor were chasing. Simon Le Bon has called Bowie 'God to me,' and Nick Rhodes credited him with showing that a pop artist could reinvent their sound and image every few years — a template Duran Duran's own restless glamour borrowed wholesale.
listen: upstream & heresource: Steve Pafford ↗
1976
StayDavid Bowie
1981
Girls on FilmDuran Duran
listen forSet 'Stay' beside 'Girls on Film' — both lock a taut, high-register funk guitar figure to a driving, elastic bassline, the whole band coiled tight around a groove instead of a simple verse-chorus strum.
Japan1980s · New wave / Art rock / Synth-pop
Duran Duran's 1981 debut arrived alongside Bowie and Roxy Music as touchstones of a wider New Romantic scene, but critics have pointed specifically to Japan's 'Quiet Life' and 'Gentlemen Take Polaroids' albums as templates Rhodes drew on directly — icy, sequenced synthesizer patterns wrapped around a fashion-conscious, faintly detached image. Rhodes has described the early Duran sound as sitting 'somewhere between Kraftwerk and Bowie,' the same cold-electronics-plus-glamour equation Japan had already worked out.
listen: upstream & here
1979
Quiet LifeJapan
1981
Planet EarthDuran Duran
listen forPlay 'Quiet Life' next to 'Planet Earth' — both open on a brittle, motorik synthesizer pulse under a cool, detached vocal, new wave's electronic sophistication dressed up as pop rather than art-rock experiment.