{"id":2442315,"date":"2019-03-29T19:09:41","date_gmt":"2019-03-30T01:09:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=814116"},"modified":"2019-03-29T19:09:41","modified_gmt":"2019-03-30T01:09:41","slug":"duran-duran-celebrate-roxy-musics-pulp-science-fiction-in-rock-hall-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/music-news\/duran-duran-celebrate-roxy-musics-pulp-science-fiction-in-rock-hall-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"Duran Duran Celebrate Roxy Music\u2019s \u2018Pulp Science Fiction\u2019 in Rock Hall Speech"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Duran Duran<\/a>\u2019s Simon Le Bon and John Taylor remembered the seismic shift of watching Roxy Music<\/a> make their British TV debut and described their lifelong affinity for the band while inducting them into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

In a recent interview<\/a>, Taylor recalled being mesmerized by Roxy Music after seeing them on television in the early Seventies. \u201cThey were just like nothing we\u2019d ever seen before,\u201d he said. \u201cThey were from outer space almost.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Years later, Duran Duran would cover the Roxy Music cut they watched on that fateful BBC broadcast, \u201cVirginia Plain,\u201d using it as an intro for their own hit, \u201cRio.\u201d Taylor would also go on to cover Roxy Music\u2019s \u201cJust Another High\u201d<\/a> on<\/em> Dream Home Heartaches\u2026 Remaking\/Remodeling Roxy Music, a tribute album he also produced.<\/em><\/p>\n

Read Duran Duran\u2019s induction speech below.<\/em><\/p>\n

Simon Le Bon:<\/strong> The 24th of August 1972; an evening in late summer. It\u2019s almost the end of the school holidays \u2014 one of those days when it felt like England was about to choke on its own nostalgia; nostalgia for the war years, for the finest hours while we, the teenagers, were screaming inside for something, anything<\/em>, to happen, and music was where we were looking for signs of life.<\/p>\n

David Bowie and the Spiders had made their debut earlier in the year; Queen\u2019s was just around the corner. It was into this atmosphere that Roxy Music dropped their pop-culture bomb on the British public, performing their first single, \u201cVirginia Plain,\u201d on prime-time BBC television.<\/p>\n

The sound was a shock to the system \u2014 a psychedelic Sinatra, crooning pop-art poetry over driving drums over oboes and saxophones, heavily treated electric guitars and the most out-there synthesizer parts you\u2019d ever heard. The musicians themselves were dressed outrageously, each one with an individual, well-defined look.<\/p>\n

Put it all together, and what you got was pulp science fiction.<\/p>\n

John Taylor:<\/strong> Their wildly exciting self-titled debut album was just as cinematic. It took the listener to burnt-out battlefields, sunlit beaches and darkened movie theaters. There was funk, country & western, rock & roll, German experimental music, doo-wop.  all hybridized into something entirely new. But this was more than just music; this was all-encompassing, pioneer lifestyle branding. This was an entire genre unto itself. This was Roxy Music!<\/p>\n

Nick Rhodes and I went to see Roxy in 1974, when they came to Birmingham. I was 14. On a Saturday afternoon we found ourselves in the lobby of the Odeon, where we made the acquaintance of two fans. They told us that if we hurried down the alley alongside the building we could hear them rehearsing. This is where I learned about the secret world of the soundcheck.<\/p>\n

There were a dozen kids standing around, all wearing Roxy T-shirts and scarves. We listened as they warmed up on songs from their latest album, Country Life<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Suddenly the music stopped, and on cue, a black Mercedes rolled up to the backstage door \u2014 I\u2019d never seen a black Mercedes in my life. In a sudden frenzy of activity, the band rushed out into the light and piled into the car, which took off at speed. A girl shouted, \u201cThey\u2019re staying at the Holiday Inn!\u201d So off we ran, at full pelt across Birmingham City Center. When the car pulled up at the hotel entrance, we were already there. I remember thinking [guitarist] Phil Manzanera was the tallest person I had ever seen, although knowing him now, it must have been the platform boots.<\/p>\n

At the show that evening, I recorded Roxy on my portable cassette player \u2014 you could do that back then! And the next night, in my darkened, suburban bedroom, I listened back, and realized what I wanted to be. I knew my destiny.<\/p>\n

Le Bon:<\/strong> The subsequent journey of Roxy Music, piloted by the open-heart surgery that was Bryan Ferry\u2019s lyric writing, would take us deep into emotion and romanticism. As listeners, this was not what we had expected. We came to party, but what we learned, was to feel.<\/p>\n

Over a 12-year span, they recorded eight studio albums, each one a masterwork, each one filled with moments that defy the dry eye. Always the experimentation, the drive, the humor, the articulate, versatile musicality. A body of work that fulfilled every promise of the electric rock era.<\/p>\n

After leaving the group in 1973, Brian Eno would become the world\u2019s most innovative studio musician: a one-man zeitgeist. Eno helped shape some of the most significant artists of our time.  He also has the distinction of being the musician most frequently cited as the answer to clues in the New York Times<\/em> crossword. \u201cMusician, Brian, three letters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taylor:<\/strong> Eno once said of the Velvet Underground, \u201cThey didn\u2019t sell many records, but everyone who bought one formed a band.\u201d Roxy sold many more records than the Velvet Underground, and they influenced the life choices of everyone who came into contact with them. The name Bryan Ferry has become a synonym for cool. He is like Cary Grant, another Englishman, whose phenomenal drive and determination lay behind an image that was made to look so effortless. Aspirational, but strongly grounded in his working-class roots, Bryan is one of the most restless spirits in 20th-century art.<\/p>\n

In his memoir, Nile Rodgers wrote that after seeing Roxy in London he tapped into what he called the \u201cDeep Hidden Meaning\u201d that would fuel the concept for his own band, Chic. The Sex Pistols were also heavily influenced by Roxy, so indirectly they helped to ignite the punk-rock revolution. And, of course, I am always proud to say that without Roxy Music there would be no Duran Duran.  Along the way, in the early Eighties, we were inadvertently able to introduce Roxy\u2019s music to our young American audience when radio stations like WLIR started to play both bands back to back.<\/p>\n

Le Bon:<\/strong> Our musical paths finally crossed in \u201985, when Nick [Rhodes] and I invited Andy Mackay to perform with us on Arcadia\u2019<\/em>s \u201cSo Red the Rose.\u201d Andy\u2019s unique style of playing saxophone and clarinet proved to be the crucially lush element in the sound that we were aiming for.<\/p>\n

Roxy Music\u2019s influence is immense and impossible to calculate. We are happy to see them here tonight, and honored to be the ones to bring them into this hallowed institution.<\/p>\n

Ladies and gentlemen, it is our pleasure to induct into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Roxy Music!<\/p>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Duran Duran\u2019s Simon Le Bon and John Taylor remembered the seismic shift of watching Roxy Music make their British TV debut and described their lifelong affinity for the band while inducting them into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In a recent interview, Taylor recalled being mesmerized by Roxy Music after seeing them on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2442315","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-16 07:36:05","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2442315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442315\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2442315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2442315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2442315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}