All through the Nineteen Eighties, The Treatment have been outliers within the mainstream music scene, and their presence was a refreshing one. Amid the wave of consumerism which ate up society due to Thatcherism and Reaganomics, Robert Smith was left feeling sick, and there was one band that he as soon as stated “represented every little thing we hated”.
So much had modified since The Treatment first emerged in the direction of the again finish of the earlier decade, and Britain had change into a radically completely different place. The start of music tv modified the trade, due to the invention of MTV, the packaging of an artist turned simply as necessary because the music itself, and this helped teams like Duran Duran immeasurably.
Though The Treatment have been publically combating with The Smiths singer Morrissey and usually went backwards and forwards within the musical press, Smith didn’t dislike their music. In 2019, he even admitted he “by no means actually understood” the feud, and Morrissey later uncharacteristically provided him a uncommon apology.
Whereas The Smiths would have been the band you’d assume Smith would have despised due to the confrontation between them, it was Duran Duran who riled the singer. They by no means stated something out of line about The Treatment and have been additionally large followers of Smith’s group, however he couldn’t cease himself from viewing them because the antithesis of every little thing he represented.
Duran Duran have been an embodiment of the ’80s and its obsession with extra. The whole lot concerning the group was grandiose, whether or not it was the extravagant music movies or their flamboyant costume sense. A lot to Smith’s frustration, they have been by no means out of the charts, and all through their profession, they’ve offered over 100 million information.
In 2019, Smith spoke to The Guardian about how The Treatment had managed to carve out a distinct segment and efficiently operated exterior the normal bubble. They developed a resilient ‘Us vs Them’ perspective, and in Smith’s eyes, there was no act that catered for the lots greater than Duran Duran.
Smith defined: “It was typically Duran Duran, which is admittedly unhappy as a result of they cherished us they usually used to come back to our reveals. However they represented every little thing we hated: the entire glamorous 80s, client bullshit; this horrorshow that we have been up towards.”
Duran Duran epitomised the attitudes that had crept into society. In movies, frontman Simon Le Bon waltzed round carelessly on a yacht in shiny clips whereas half the nation was present process intense monetary hardship.
Of their defence, Duran Duran’s music was merely slick pop which didn’t have an overt political message. Nevertheless, they have been undeniably a product of their occasions, and whether or not the band appreciated her or not, they have been an epoch of Thatcherism.
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