Saturday, August 4, 2012

Extra: New Duran Duran Book

(This is the second of three weeks where I was supposed to pass along info about new books. There were supposed to be 5 copies of the book given out...but the PR guy over at Rhino dropped the ball. Sorry about that, but please keep in mind when you read this that it's not Lyndsay Parker's fault that her PR guy threw it into the stands. Anyway, here it is:)

In her book Careless Memories of Strange Behavior: My Notorious Life as a Duran Duran Fan, Lyndsay Parker touches on a point I made here last year...the girls my age were really wild about Duran Duran, while the boys my age really only liked them if they wanted to attract those girls. That was true for me, except for "Save a Prayer" (which I admitted I liked then) it really took until the next decade before I finally looked at the group's music in a light that wasn't tainted by the fact that they were on every Tiger Beat cover I remember seeing on the newsstand for three years.

Actually, when talking about music with women who are around my age, I usually get a surprised reaction whnen I answer "Duran Duran" to the question: "Do you know who I really liked?" And I don't really understand why...I remember that I was passed over during my adolescence because I didn't look like Nick Rhodes or Simon LeBon. Guys don't forget stuff like that easily. Nor did I forget that one of the first times a previously "unobtainable" girl actually talked with me was when I rattled off the names of all five of the group's members. When you're 12, that's power.

Today, of course, the band is mentioned as an influence by a lot of musicians who weren't likely to admit to it 25-30 years ago. That's also something that Parker covers in her book.

Since this is an extra post, I get to dig into the archives for a song by the group that wasn't a Hot 100 hit. Here's an early classic of theirs that wasn't ready for the American charts yet:




Here's the links to get them at either iTunes or Amazon...and if you don't have an e-reader, that's okay. They can be read on the computer, too:

Careless Memories of Strange Behavior: My Notorious Life As a Duran Duran Fan - Lyndsey Parker

Each is available at $2.46, with no shipping charges and just a few minutes needed before you're reading it.

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