Arena

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I can live without “The Reflex”, I can live without “New Moon on Monday”, but the few Duran Duran songs I can’t live without are all here (except “Rio”, but the 2004 remastered version with the bonus tracks fixed that): “Hungry Like the Wolf” and “Save a Prayer” and “The Seventh Stranger” and “The Chauffeur”, and then a bunch of the kind of interchangeable songs where it hardly matters which songs they picked. The guy had an enormous amount of talent to be able to take such lyrical gobbledygook and sing about it like his heart was breaking. Once I knew she’d slipped in, I used my legitimate ticket to get in and we joined some really nice people on the lawn who kind enough to let a couple of latecomers crowd in.

But if I was going to select ten of them, I’m not sure I’d make many changes from the ten they picked for this release. And as far as the American charts went, that was mostly that (although I will always maintain that “Electric Barbarella” from Medazzaland may just be their finest song ever, and for a fleeting moment recaptured that early 80s magic in a way no band has since).I don’t think I even realized back then it was a live album, but I really loved it – great song after great song. Take “ The 100 Greatest Prog Artists of All Time ” (as though there had actually been 100 prog artists worth mentioning).

Popular though they may have been in their prime, but they were pretty formulaic in the early 80s, and hearing any random Duran Duran song was hardly different than hearing any other. New Religion" was recorded 9 February at The Forum in Los Angeles, and " Cracks in the Pavement" was recorded at the 5 March 1984 show at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto, at the same concert where the video for " The Reflex" was filmed. He almost has me caring that “the union of the snake is on the climb” with the amount of passion he puts into singing about it. Two further live cuts from the 1984 world tour were released as B-sides to singles in 1984: " New Religion (Live in LA)" on the North American single for " The Reflex" and the live " Cracks in the Pavement (1984)" on " The Wild Boys". Notorious” would be a disappointment in about every way imaginable, and they were completely left behind by the rest of the music world by the time the 80s slouched to its hair band denouement.And – other than the hit James Bond theme “A View to a Kill” – Arena was our last glimpse of Duran Duran at the top.