![]() Never forget the dog.Esile Duran finds it difficult to distinguish between her colleagues. Somehow managed to get a lovely lady to marry him, and with her have two daughters. He's taught one or two classes a semester in the journalism and mass communications department at Cal State Long Beach since 2006. Earned his first newspaper paycheck at the Belleville (Ill.) News-Democrat, fled the Midwest for Los Angeles Daily News and finally ended up at the Orange County Register. Earned a master's degree at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. with degrees in English and Communications. ![]() Graduated from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore. He grew up, in order, in California, Arkansas, Kentucky and Oregon. He regularly covers the Oscars and the Emmys, goes to Comic-Con and Coachella, reviews pop music, and conducts interviews with authors and actors, musicians and directors, a little of this and a whole lot of that. Peter Larsen has been the Pop Culture Reporter for the Orange County Register since 2004, finally achieving the neat trick of getting paid to report and write about the stuff he's obsessed about pretty much all his life. Then “Rio,” perhaps the band’s signature tune, wrapped it all up, as fireworks lit the night sky, or more accurately the cloudy drizzle, and the happy crowd shuffled through puddles on the soggy march home. Le Bon dedicated “Save a Prayer” to the Queen, and asked the audience to light up the Bowl with their camera lights, a sight that might have produced chills, or maybe it was just the rain. Garson stuck around for the rest of the encore, too. The slick funk-disco of Chic was an important early influence on Duran Duran – Rodgers and Chic delivered a terrific opening set of songs he’s been part of with that band – “Le Freak,” “Good Times” – and on his own – “Modern Love,” by David Bowie, another of Duran’s inspirations.įor the encore, Duran Duran were joined by Bowie’s longtime pianist Mike Garson to cover Bowie’s “Five Years,” a lovely treat. 1 singles in the United States.Ī cover of Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel’s “White Lines (Don’t Do It) had the now-drenched fans dancing enthusiastically, before “Girls On Film,” mashed up here with Calvin Harris’s “Acceptable in the ’80s,” closed out the main set. The final run of the main set took off with “Planet Earth,” the band’s debut single in 1981, and then “The Reflex,” the first of its two No. Ukraine, which is currently fighting a war against Russia, got a nod when Le Bon dedicated the lovely ballad “Ordinary World” to its people while the blue and yellow flag of that nation fluttered on the video screens on stage. The band’s self-titled 1981 debut provided four songs in the set, with a pair of them – “Friends of Mine” and “Careless Memories” – somewhat deeper cuts. Rhodes might have been the winner, though, in a turquoise suit that glittered in the stage lights. John Taylor matched him in a slightly different shade of pink jacket and black skinny jeans. Le Bon wore a pink jacket and sparkly silver pants. We should also note that Duran Duran remain a very colorful and stylishly dressed band. Other highlights in the first half of the show included “Notorious,” for which opening act Nile Rodgers of Chic came out to play the tune’s funky riff, and the band’s James Bond theme song, “A View to a Kill.” The lyric, “And your telephone’s been ringing while you’re dancing in the rain” also got a big response because, duh, we’re Southern Californians, and OMG, it was literally happening – what are the odds?Īnd the even bigger hit, “Hungry Like The Wolf” followed, one of three songs in the set from the 1982 album “Rio,” which, thanks to some of the first cinematic music videos and the then-new MTV, broke the band into the big time.īut this 40th Anniversary Tour wasn’t just about the nostalgia for this band and these songs, though certainly that was a big part of the draw.ĭuran Duran’s most recent album, “Future Past,” released in 2021, features strong new songs such as “Invisible” and “All Of You,” both of which were slotted near the top of the set, and while they might not have been as familiar, they sounded like they should or could be classic Duran.
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