goldfish 30 Albums 30 Stories, music, NaBloPoMo, NaNoWriMo

30 Albums, 30 Stories: Seven And The Ragged Tiger

ddrtfrThis November, I’ll be telling 30 stories about 30 albums. The albums on this list are not necessarily my favorite albums, but they are the ones that are instantly associated with a time and place. All of these albums represent a chapter of my life. This is the story of those albums, and by extension, the story of me, presented mostly chronologically.

Album 3: Seven And The Ragged Tiger by Duran Duran.

My sister was (and still is, I suppose) four years, six months and five days older that me. That’s a huge age gap when you’re a kid. The age difference meant that she didn’t want much to do with her pesky kid sister once she became a tween.

Like most girls in the 1980s, she was an enormous, all-encompassing fan of Duran Duran. If you remember the 80s at all, you remember Duran Duran. They were bigger than N’sync, The Backstreet Boys & Justin Bieber put together, and honestly, way cooler.

My sister was in love with John Taylor. I was always a Simon girl myself, but one of my sister’s friends had dibs on Simon, so I got stuck with Roger. At least it wasn’t Andy. Nobody wanted Andy. Poor Andy.

Roger, Nick, Simon, Andy & John. It's sad that I didn't have to look that up.
Roger, Nick, Simon, Andy & John. It’s sad that I didn’t have to look that up.

My sister was a Duranny, so I was a Duranny by proximity. The furor that surrounded the release of Seven And The Ragged Tiger among schoolgirls was unbelievable. At that point, Duran Duran already had two massive albums under their belt and this was the newest!!! Like, OH MY GOD, A NEW DURAN DURAN ALBUM!!! SQUEEEEE!

I clearly recall going with my sister after Catholic school on the very day it was released and waiting in an interminable line to pick up a copy on vinyl. Then, she took it home and digested it, bit by bit, until she had consumed it all. She wouldn’t even let me in the same room with her until she had listened to it once all the way through.

Nobody would say so, but it wasn’t as good as the first two albums. This band and this album will always and forever remind me of my sister and that period in both of our lives.

Favorite track:

I never really liked this album all that much (the title is the best part), but I’ll have to go for The Seventh Stranger, because it’s the most musically interesting.