It’s John Taylor’s birthday today! (born Nigel John Taylor, June 20th 1960) In honor, I’m posting the transcript with corresponding lyrics (carefully annotated and printed on a early-80′s dot matrix printer) that my friend Allyson and I obsessively pieced together and @tinglealley documented in her article for The Awl “Look Back in Eyeliner: Three Girls at a Duran Duran Sleepover in 1984.″ There was a mix tape that we made as well, but unfortunately the only copy was sent to Simon LeBon’s parents (hahahaha, I can barely type that with a straight face).

The transcript is embarrassing to say the least, a glimpse into the minds of two 13 and 14 year old girls, consumed with infatuation for Simon and John and fascinated with sexuality. If you are not willing to read through the entire thing, basically the story is that there is a woman (Blue Silver) that both Simon and John want. She is a virgin and engaged to John (who Simon thinks will hurt her) so Simon has a big internal argument with himself (“strong ego” and “weak ego”) over his friendship vs desire. Desire wins. They do “it” (again, hahahaha, we couldn’t even write the word “sex”). John and Blue Silver get married anyway, Simon gives her hats and scarves for a wedding present to keep her cold heart warm. The story line plays out in the lyrics from the Rio era and each numbered line on the stunningly insightful transcript corresponds to the number on the lyrics sheets: Lonely in Your Nightmare, New Religion (this is Simon’s big internal ego argument), Last Chance on the Stairway, Save a Prayer, Like an Angel (b-side to “My Own Way”) and “The Chauffeur.”

We literally stayed up all night working on this project back in ‘84, searching deep into hidden messages communicated only to us through Simon’s poetry. One of these days I will try to recreate the awesomeness of the mix tape and wrap it with the Duran bumper sticker I saved from 1984.