5/31/2023 0 Comments Duran duran today![]() You said, “Duran Duran has always been a fairly volatile situation because we have a very unnerving hierarchy in that we’re all massive egomaniacs.” I found an Entertainment Tonight interview from 1986. I mean, you’ve really got to play the long game. But we’ve since found that if one person really doesn’t want to do something, we really try to avoid making them do it. We used to think that if three of the four of us felt something strongly, then we would do that. We just have to find something that works for all of us. So, when the band’s reassembling to do an album, that means I’m essentially going to be away from home for a long period of time. I mean, first of all, everybody else lives in London. I mean, I tend to come down the middle, I would say. Oh my God, it’s all about band dynamics, really, at this stage. When you guys are considering recording an album and touring, is there one member that’s always most difficult to get on board? There was a lot more appreciation and gratitude for what we still get to do. I think that timeout made Future Past a much better album. We came back with a completely different attitude toward each other, toward the music. on the 13th of March, and I think it was 10 months later, maybe, that we were finally back in the studio picking up the strands. I was working in London but I live in L.A., so I came back to L.A. We had two months to deliver the album and we were fighting over everything. Strangely, for us, the time out was really beneficial to our process. I mean, when it came, we were really on the final straight of making our new album, Future Past. Did lockdown drive you or anybody else in the band crazy? Eric Clapton apparently went a bit crazy because he was unable to perform. There were some performers who seemed to be driven somewhat nuts by the lockdown. I actually feel it’s important right now to get out on the road and create a forum for people to be together, and to give them a place to dance and mindlessly sing along and clap, and just be. I think the lockdown has changed priorities a little bit. John Taylor: All of the above and then some. Do you do it for the dough, the adulation, the actual playing of music, the travel? Candidly, tell me what sort of allure touring still holds for you. LAMag: So, you’re playing the Hollywood Bowl. In mid-August (which, we should note, long preceded the death of Queen Elizabeth II), Taylor hopped on the line to discuss the secret to the band’s longevity, snitty music critics, music’s stroppiest Mancunian and Meghan Markle. Forty-two years after settling on the band lineup that made their megahit album, Rio, Taylor-now joined by three out of four of those original Durans-will perform at The Hollywood Bowl on Friday night. This is despite having disappointed many in 1999 by marrying Juicy Couture co-founder Gela Nash. It's amazing.John Taylor is not only Duran Duran’s bass player but, as an informal survey of several hyperventilating women over 40 recently revealed, still the band’s hottest member. He doesn't cheat on the high notes like a lot of singers his age do. Simon Le Bon is close to 60 years old and can belt out these songs just as he did 30 years ago. How these guys have managed to buck the aging process so successfully is difficult to process. The Bowie tribute during the breakdown for "Planet Earth" is heartfelt and appropriate. Casual fans might not even know the difference. The new stuff works well with the classics. The last tour in support of All You Need Is Now managed to mix in hits with albums cuts as well as a few surprises, but this tour is leaning heavily on the hits with new songs off Paper Gods carefully interspersed so as not to interrupt the flow. So, inevitably, those hardcore fans hoping for a smattering of deep cuts will be somewhat disappointed this go round. You can't please everyone with your setlist when you have as many hits as this band does. Not to mention extraordinary musicianship. Stage presence, glitz, glamor, pretentious weirdness. The band understands how to put on a show that not only entertains but also impresses. I've seen Duran Duran nine times over the course of the last 23 years.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |