Like so many of Britain’s biggest bands, a spirit of experimentalism borne out of art-school beginnings planted a fire in the bellies of Duran Duran. When schoolboy friends Nick Rhodes (then Nicholas Bates) and John Taylor (previously the rather less rockist-named Nigel Taylor) formed Duran Duran with collegemate Stephen Duffy, it was with a mission statement to fuse the rock energy of the Sex Pistols with the discofied style of Chic – although at the height of the ‘disco sucks’ movement, the band’s love of Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards’ work was decidedly unfashionable. However, throwing the studied synth-pop dynamics of Japan and the art-rock ambitiousness of Berlin-era Bowie into the stew, the band reckoned they had hit upon a ready-made formula for success.
Duran Duran played their first show at Birmingham Polytechnic on 5 April 1979 – a 30-minute set to just 20 people. A later support slot to fellow Birmingham band Fashion at the Barbarella’s venue attracted a certain Roger Taylor to the audience. “I just thought this band could be the next big thing out of Birmingham. I don’t know why I had that feeling,” the drummer explained.