The first record I ever owned (well, cassette actually) was Duran Duran’s Seven and The Ragged Tiger. While my tastes may have strayed a long way from pop over the years, I always felt that the band, along with, say, Madonna, represented the epitome of what pop could be – largely danceable, mass-audience pleasing music played by genuine (and passionate) musicians with a broad range of influences underpinning their songs. Moreover, while Duran Duran were perfectly capable of unleashing gargantuan, crowd-pleasing anthems, there was always a dark core – a feeling the band could turn on you given half a chance, as evidenced by the silvery strains of The Chauffeur or (I’m Looking For) Cracks in The Pavement. While I haven’t been a faithful follower over the years, I’ve always felt a youthful rush of excitement when the band announce a new project and, when it was announced that the new album would feature guitar contributions from Blur’s art-rock inclined guitarist Graham Coxon, I knew that I’d be buying a Duran Duran album on day of release for the first time in an age.
It started with a single – the surprisingly catchy Invisible – released to general acclaim earlier in the year, and the band also chose to lead the album off with the same track. It doesn’t exactly explode into life (few of their albums start with as strong an opening gambit as The Reflex), but the slow burn intro is effective and, once the chorus kicks in, it’s clear that the band have lost none of their gift for penning memorable melodies. Maintaining the pace, All of You, with its taut bass line and stuttering synth harks right back to the first album, the intervening years falling away as the band plunge headlong into another sparkling chorus. Built around a dancefloor-shaking beat, Give It All Up is nonetheless a slow-burning number that makes good use of hazy vocals and sympathetic guitar work to reel the listener in before ensnaring them with another chrome-plated chorus. An album highlight, Anniversary not only has a gorgeous melody, but also a tougher vibe reminiscent of Rio and you can’t help but feel that, in a less jaded era, this would be vying for the number one slot.
Heading into rather nostalgic territory, Future Past recalls some of the elegance of The Wedding Album, albeit not quite stepping into the classic territory of, say, Come Undone. A whispered intro telling us: “this is how it starts” kicks us in to the retro-dance stomp of Velvet Newton, which sounds bizarrely like Jeff Wayne’s War of The Worlds going head-to-head with Chemical Brothers. It segues directly into the spring-loaded dance-funk of Beautiful Lies, a track that, for all its future trimmings, could comfortably sit alongside the band’s classic material without raising an eyebrow. It’s followed by one of the album’s few missteps – the rather trite Tonight United. While you can’t fault the intent that underpins it (a hangover from the era of Live Aid, in which Duran Duran played an integral part), it’s too earnest a pastiche of the huge charity singles that pockmarked the era, and it does the album few favours.
Getting back to the plot, the slow-burning Wing harks back to Rio’s darkest moments, elevated by echoing guitar and a minor key vocal that perfectly suits Simon’s honeyed tones. It’s followed by the eerie intro to Nothing Less. Built around a heartbeat and possessed of a sense of loss that makes it feel rather like the come down after the party, it gives way to a track caught between classic Duran Duran and The Cure. Underpinned with trademark stabs of funky bass and swirled with atmospheric synths, Laughing Boy is another track that deftly bridges past and present, recalling Duran Duran’s glory years while simultaneously highlighting their desire to continue forward – not least in Coxon’s beautifully skwonky solo. A weaker track, Hammerhead (feat. Ivorian Doll) misuses Ivorian Doll’s guest spot, the rest of the track veering into ill-advised anthemic funk reminiscent of So-era Peter Gabriel but lacking that album’s madcap sense of experimentation. It slips into the eerie Invocation, a short track that provides a neat bridge to the ecstatic More Joy! (Feat. Chai), a sparkling outing, sensibly deployed as a single, with a pounding beat and a twinkle in its eye. Yet even here, Duran Duran aren’t going to make it too obvious, and Graham Coxon’s guitar is employed as a secret weapon, adding art rock vibes that, rather ironically, sees the track recall early Gorillaz – I bet it’ll be killer live. The album concludes with the poignant, Bowie-esque Falling (feat. Bowie collaborator Mike Garson), a strong finale to an album that deftly juggles past glories and future aspirations with no small amount of skill.
A surprisingly easy album in which to get lost, Future Past does exactly as its title suggests, referencing the best of Duran Duran’s output over the years, while keeping at least one finger on a modern pulse. It’s not a perfect album – the band’s worst tendencies come to a head on tracks like Tonight United and, to a lesser extent, Hammerhead – but there’s so much here to enjoy, from the obvious joy Duran Duran exhibit in their performances, to the hook laden anthems that abound. In this era of increasing artifice, it’s truly fantastic to dig into a pop album that’s kept its heart and soul fully intact. 8.5/10
