The internationally adored band’s John Taylor talks about Atlantic City, ‘Rio’ and the new album.
Duran Duran’s All You Need Is Now could have just as easily been dubbed All You Need Is Then. The veteran pop-rock band’s latest album harkens back to the act’s early 1980s salad days.
The new songs are slick, stylish and dramatic. They fit perfectly in the group’s Rio/Seven and the Ragged Tiger days.
Looking back makes sense here as the band has recorded its best album in 20 years. The group should thank producer Mark Ronson for coming up with the inspired concept.
“He had a vision,” bassist John Taylor tells Atlantic City Weekly while calling from New York.
“He was all about us returning to where we once where. He wanted a sequel to the Rio album. It was fortunate that he talked to us about this since we were open to it. We would have turned the idea down five, 10 years ago because we were always into sounding as contemporary as possible. Trying to sound modern all of the time can be exhausting at the end of the day {though]. The great thing about the Rolling Stones is that they could always fall back on being a blues band. We never thought we could fall back on a sound, but we did and I’m glad we did it.”
Duran Duran, which will perform Saturday, Oct. 29 at Atlantic City’s Borgata, is clearly in its comfort zone. Such new songs as “Girl Panic,” “Blame the Machines” and “Being Followed” fit right in next to old hits as “Hungry Like the Wolf,” “Girls on Film” and “Union of the Snake.”
The fresh material is like a well-worn blanket to shroud Durannies.
The British band, which formed in 1978, has come full-circle. Taylor says he is proud of the band’s sound and how it has been around for more than 30 years.
“I think that’s quite an achievement,” says Taylor. “That’s especially so since we were critically battered, particularly during our first decade.”
Taylor, 51, felt the pain from the slings and arrows since he regularly read music criticism in English rock rags during the mid-’70s.
“Getting that [criticized] is never fun but my wife [Juicy Couture co-founder Gela Nash] says, ‘You’re like Juicy,’” says Taylor.
“‘You’re embraced by the people.’ We have to be happy with that. The people have supported us for so many years.”
Since Duran Duran, which also includes vocalist Simon Le Bon, keyboardist Nick Rhodes and drummer Roger Taylor (no relation to John) has been around for so long, it’s never easy to put a set list together.
“Deciding what we play each night is a daily battle,” says Taylor. “We’re always discussing that, but it’s a good thing to discuss. That means we’ve been around for awhile and had some success. I would love to stick around with these guys for many more years. We really enjoy playing with each other. We know each other so well and that makes it much easier than playing with people you’re unfamiliar with.
As we continue our countdown of “Best Lists” at Atlantic City Weekly, here are the 10 best interviews we had in 2011, in alphabetical order.
Madonna. Seinfeld. Kelly Pavlik vs. Bernard Hopkins. Duran Duran. These are a few of the major entertainment events being sponsored by Harrah's Entertainment through the company's four Atlantic City ...
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Compiledby Steve Angelucci, Mike Epifanio and Lori Hoffman It could easily be argued that 2003 was the most significantyear for Atlantic City's since the first casino hotel, Resorts International,opened in 1978. Not only did we witness the opening of the Borgata, 13 yearsafter the last new casino opened, but 2003 also ushered in the debut of TheWalk, a major shopping destination in the heart of the city's midtown district.The shopping and dining choices were also bolstered by the unveiling of SiganosPlaza and Opa Restaurant on the 1700 block of the Boardwalk. The hotel-roomcount leaped to over 14,500 representing a desperately needed 20 percentincrease in the number of available rooms in the city. New lounges and beachbars, more live entertainment and revue shows combined to give visitors so manymore fun choices for diversions. Meanwhile, with the renovations to BoardwalkHall having been completed the previous year, the biggest names in headlineentertainment seemed to have made Atlantic City a new mandatory stop on theirNorth American tour schedules. Five of the six highest-grossing concert acts inthe United States performed in the resort during 2003. With all of theexcitement building to fever pitch, the town was given a new slogan, "AlwaysTurned On." The media bought...
� You don't have to look too closely at this year's spring music calendar to guess that casino executives are banking on a busier-than-usual prelude to summer in 2005. With such a high-caliber entertainment lineup booked in town this spring, staring at the list of offerings (p. 30) makes it seem like August is upon us, not April. When's the last time artists as huge as Green Day and Elvis Costello made their Atlantic City debuts more than a month before Memorial Day Weekend? Do you recall the casinos collectively offering such a varied and rich music line-up in April? With all of the amplifiers, drum kits and acoustic guitars being loaded into Atlantic City over the next few weeks, the hope is that the audiences will follow. And as far as ticket sales indicate, they will. Something's happening here and what it seems to be is that the town, formerly known exclusively for its summertime fun and gaming attractions, is edging even closer to becoming the year-round entertainment destination that many had hoped it would blossom into. Looking back at last April, aside from a couple of noteworthy headliners, it was the same old scene in Atlantic City's headline entertainment world....
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1. Joe Gizzi said... on Oct 30, 2011 at 07:14PM
“The Borgata Duran Duran show was superb. They played their classics as well some cool new tunes. Mr. John Taylor proves he can still play that funky bass guitar! Simon still sings the tunes just like they sound on the albums.
Great night out as always at the Borgata!”