Still Hungry Like the Wolf
More than 35 years since their 80’s heyday, Duran Duran is sounding (not to mention aging) better than ever. When they announced their two-night St. Patrick’s weekend shows at the Agua Caliente Casino in the Coachella Valley back in December, I picked up a pair of tickets for Irene’s b-day gift.
What made it even sweeter were the amazing seats we scored in this intimate venue: second row in the loge — just above the floor seating with completely unobstructed views of our boy Simon Le Bon, who was in fine voice as always! Simon takes his vocals very seriously and this night was no different than any of the previous couple of shows Irene and I have seen together; his range was impeccable, from holding a falsetto note on songs like the new uptempo “Last Night in the City” to classic ballads like “Ordinary World.” He has definitely distinguished himself as one of the most engaging all-around lead singers in the game!
Our boy LeBon
On being able to remain relevant after all these years, bassist John Taylor told the Dallas Observer in a recent feature: “You can’t fake it. You’ve just got to have the burn and not get hung up on the past. So many of my peers that don’t do music for a living don’t have anything positive to say about contemporary music. You got to be really open and be prepared to really go digging because I think it’s important that you have a sense of what’s happening right now and it’s important that what’s happening right now feeds into the music that we’re making.”
Equally relevant at this show was the band’s stage theatrics: the confetti cannons (during “Pressure Off”), the giant beach balls (“Rio”) and Simon’s request for the audience to pull their iPhones out of their pockets and turn on the flashlight (during “Save a Prayer”) was all reminiscent of any recent Coldplay show. And the big screens on either side of the stage (one right above our excellent seats that afforded us even closer close-ups of the action) provided great animated backdrops for each song as well.
The set list
With 14 albums (plus four greatest hits packages) under their belt, D-squared definitely had their work cut out for them deciding which songs to play live but their choices were satisfying for this show; highlights from the 90-minute, 16-song set list (including two encores) for me were “View to a Kill,” “Is There Something I Should Know” and “Notorious” while Irene could be heard belting out “Wild Boys” and “Hungry Like the Wolf” at an enthusiastic volume!
Pic(s) of the Week: Bugged Out
Mowing the lawn this past weekend turned into a National Geographic creepy-crawler photo shoot. Taken on my iPhone7, these pix show a variety of insects that we corralled, starting with a two-inch black beetle, which we decided to drop into a plastic flower pot liner with a caterpillar and some potato bugs, and then the final shot showing the grisly demise of the grub, whom the beetle was obviously merely sizing up in the second photo.
Pic of the Week: BurGR, BaBY!
To celebrate Miss A’s performance at her gymnastics meet in Las Vegas last weekend, we hit Gordon Ramsay’s BurGR on the Vegas Strip (the “GR” in the name is chef’s initials that fit conveniently into the word, sans the “e” of course)! GReat BurGRs and even GReater all-around weekend! (See what I did there? Using the word “all-around”
saluting the gymnastic theme of the weekend!)
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