Synopsis

Duran Duran perform "My Own Way" in a stylized studio setting dominated by red, black, and white. The fast-paced editing favors tight close-ups of the band, emphasizing their fashion, expressions, and energetic performance. Flamenco dancers add movement and theatrical flair in the background, while a brightly colored parrot creates one of the video's strangest visual touches by perching on the synthesizers and pecking at the keyboardist's fingers. The result is a compact, deliberately artificial showcase of early-1980s style.

Factoids & Trivia

• The video was filmed on a soundstage in St. John's Wood, London, rather than at an exotic location. The set's red, black, and white color scheme made the clip a much more contained production than the band's later location-based videos.

• John Taylor later described the clip as being "like 'Planet Earth' part two," emphasizing its reliance on color, fashion, visual energy, and what could be achieved on a soundstage in a single day.

• The parrot became the video's most unusual prop. Its behavior around the synthesizers, including pecking at the keyboardist's fingers, gives the otherwise tightly controlled performance an element of comic unpredictability.

• "My Own Way" was released as a stand-alone single in November 1981, before Duran Duran began work on the main sessions for Rio. The band later reworked the song for the album, making the single version a distinct early-period recording.

• The single reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart and No. 10 in Australia. It was not released in the United States at the band's request.

• The video was later included in the band's pioneering 1983 video compilation, Duran Duran, which won the Grammy Award for Best Long Form Music Video in 1984.