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By June, Duran Duran had conquered America as well. In April, "Rio" went into the Top 15, followed by "Is There Something I Should Know," which landed at Number Four. The latter single was bundled onto a reissue of Duran Duran, which subsequently went into the Top 10, and added another gold record to the band's burgeoning pile. In November, 1983, the group began a lightning world tour, which encompassed the U.K., Japan, Australia, Canada, finishing, at the end of December, at Madison Square Garden in N.Y.C. By this time, MTV was now beginning to have an impact. When the channel first went on air in 1981, its demise was immediately predicted. Anyone lucky enough to live within its catchment area, and old enough to remember, was initially sucked in, just on the novelty value alone. But in truth, it was crap. How many times could one watch that Judas Priest video or those burlesque girls dancing out of time with Zeppelin's "Trampled Underfoot?" However, Duran Duran's management had grasped MTV's potential immediately. So did quite a few other bands, but what those groups hadn't quite understood was the creative opportunity the channel offered. While the Rolling Stones played along to "Start Me Up" in an empty studio, Duran Duran had flown off to Sri Lanka to shoot the mini-epic "Hungry Like The Wolf." And it was this generational divide that launched the second British invasion. In the U.K., punk had seen off the dinosaurs of rock, in the U.S. they survived, and thus - young bands either followed in their foot- steps, or by and large languished in cult obscurity "MTV had to be progressive," John explains, "because nobody wanted to watch Black Sabbath videos all night, there was no video for 'Stairway To Heaven.' If MTV had had its way at the start, they would have simply reflected the most popular radio format, which was rock radio at that time, but they couldn't do that, because the videos didn't exist." Now. they did, and they were arriving from Britain in large numbers. The results were immediate, MTV now reflected the - radio charts and influenced them as well. No longer would Duran Duran drag their way up the chart, now their singles would liter- ally rocket into the Top Ten. Thus the success of "Is There Something I Should Know" and its follow-up, "Union of The Snake." The latter hit Number. Three on both sides on the Atlantic, this time, a mere month apart. The latter single arrived in the midst of the band's world tour. Their sensational rise in the U.S., left the band, management, and promoters in chaos. "We were literally on the third date of the tour, and we were booking the 15th date of - the tour," John recalls with some amazement. "Again, we were on the run, and it was growing as we were doing it." Duran Duran's new album, Seven And The Ragged Tiger, saw success almost as quickly.

The title is actually explained by John's earlier comparison of the band to a group of commandos. And if they were, this would be the perfect name for their unit, as the ragged tiger was the symbol of luck and success. But why seven? Because the unit wasn't the hand alone, but the Berrow brothers as well. Refusing to rest on their laurels, Duran Duran continued pressing forward into new musical territories. "The Reflex" was obviously the most successful of their maneuvers, wedding a funky rhythm to the latest electro-beats, then spinning together an unforgettable chorus and verse that by rights should never have been joined, yet still melded together seamlessly "New Moon On Monday" was an excursion into glossy pop, while "I Take The Dice" and "Shadows On Your Side" actually found the band foraging through the '60s, and dragging their spoils into '80s dancepop. "Of Crime And Passion" was equally unexpected, looting elements of both the Cult and Echo and the Bunnymen. "Tiger Tiger" was a showcase for both John's pulsing bass and Rhodes' exquisite keyboards. In Britain, Seven And The Ragged Tiger deservedly sailed to the top slot in December, in America it took a little longer, until February, when it finally hit its high of Number Eight. The record would spend a bit over a year in the charts, although not as long as Duran Duran, which remained in for a phenomenal 87 weeks.

Duran Duran's next single, "New Moon On Monday," sailed into the U.K. Top 10 in February. Back across the pond, the band collected two Grammy video awards later that month, something that at best left John cold, at worst was somewhat irritating. "The videos were equal parts fun and absolute nightmare. I don't think you ever really know when you're doing something, and we never really had time to sit back and say, 'Hey didn't we do a great job there?' Because we were always onto the next thing. I think we always had a bit of a discursive attitude towards the videos anyway "I got two Grammy's for videos, but I don't really count them as Grammy's. So when people ask if I've had any Grammy's, I'll say, 'We'll, they're for videos.' We sort of felt, not really appreciating what the videos were doing for us, giving us an audience basically, we were like, 'I don't want to talk about fucking videos all the time, what about the music man?" Andy feels even stronger. "People say to me, 'You know you stay out of the way in the videos.' Fucking right! I used to hate doing them. I don't know why it intimidated me so much, but the camera being bunged up your nose, it used to really frighten me. Tie me to the windmill please!" The windmill, of course, being the contraption that Le Bon was tied to in "The Wild Boys" video. In a freak accident, the windmill's mechanism stopped while the singer was underwater, and he came close to drowning. Andy, himself, ended up in hospital after their Sri Lankan video shoot. "I'm riding on elephants and swimming in the water they pissed in. I got really sick, I caught a virus, and had to go to hospital for four days once we got back to the UK. That's my memory of making the videos."

It was no wonder that he and John would get drunk and hide during filming! In contrast, Rhodes is less dismissive, and has a better appreciation of the impact the band's videos had both musically and artistically. "When we came out, videos were new; it was a blank canvas, and we could paint whatever we wanted on it. Now it's definitely much harder trying to come up with ideas for a new; exciting video that's really going to he innovative, where people are going to 'go, 'that's really special.' Most ideas within the format have been tackled in one way or the other, somebody's always going to have another way of looking at something, but go and do something on location, it's been done. Some of our videos I can look at now and they make me smile, others make me cringe, others I think that was really great, that was really unique. I think they document the '80s in a very direct way. Today, the videos have come to define Duran Duran, but at the time, they were merely a taster for reality or so believed the three quarters of a million people that bought tickets for their live 'shows during their 1984 world tour. And that's' because the band were as innovative onstage as they were on video, as a viewing of Arena amply proves. And the hits kept coming. "The Reflex", remixed by Nile Rodgers, topped the charts all over the world, America and Britain included. "The Wild Boys" only made it to Number Two, on both sides of the Atlantic, a chart position that belies the song's true impact. As Duran Duran had moved further into the teen market, they'd left behind a segment of their older, more serious music fans. That group now returned in droves, impressed by the industrial edge and experimental creativit,,, the single brimmed with. "Wild Boys" was added to Arena, a strange decision considering it was a live album. But fans didn't seem to mind, they snapped it up in massive quantities, adding more gold records to the pile, and thrusting it up to Number Six and Four in the U.K. and U.S. respectively. On a simple level, the album's success was guaranteed by the showgoers alone, now they'd have a chance to actually hear what they'd been screaming through. In reality, Arena was evenly split between its strengths and weaknesses. It showed Le Bon up in a particularly bad light, as too often his vocals came across as weedy A phenomenal visual performer, the record did not do him justice.

The production was also lacking to some extent. Although the sonics were excellent, Duran Duran have a very full sound, yet too often on the record they sounded sparse. However, on the plus side, the mix was extremely strong, and all the instruments were deftly separated, thus allowing listeners to appreciate the band's considerable musical talents. But Duran Duran barely had time to read the reviews, because they were busy recording Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas?" It was exhausting, they'd done three world tours in as many years. There was no rest from the press, the pressures, the demands, and the fans. And still, everyone wanted more. To make things worse, the offers were so good it was difficult to refuse. I mean, how do you turn down the opportunity to write and perform the theme song for a Bond movie. You can't, and Duran Duran didn't. The single, "A View To A Kill," was yet another hit upon it's May release. So, after making 'A View For A Kill' of course the pressure was on to do another album, and we said no," Rhodes relates. "So, instead we went off and pushed ourselves in different directions." But the members still had to give the label something, and thus was born the Power Station and Arcadia. The latter was formed by Rhodes, Le Bon, and Roger Taylor with a legion of guest musicians and vocalists. The former band was put together by the other two Taylors, and featured Robert Palmer and former Chic drummer Tony Thompson.

"I needed a break from Duran," John elaborates. "I wasn't used to being part of a...the very things that appealed to me about being in a band, became so constrictive; the idea that everywhere I went people thought I was one of three brothers. I needed to sort of state my own independence really." Which makes perfect sense, except that Andy came along as well. Yeah...but it wasn't a;ways going to be that way, actually, but Andy really took hold of it. You know, it's the way these things happen. I had the initial dream, but without Andy's practicality, he really brought it to bear; things have an uncanny way of coming together. I'd hung out with Robert [Palmer] a few times, and we'd get drunk together, we just liked each other basically. I liked his work, and I thought it would be a great idea to have Robert sing on the album. "That, by the way, was going to have a number of different singers on it initially, that was the plan, we didn't have any sense of forming a band. I was dating Bebe Buel, and the idea was initially to cut a version of her singing [T Rex's] 'Bang A Gong.' That was the original idea for the band, to get it together with Tony Thompson, and do this really funky version of 'Bang A Gong.' "Then I fell out with Bebe, but we wanted to keep it going. By this point, Andy and I had demoed 'Some Like It Hot' and 'Murderers' maybe, and Robert came in to sing 'Some Communication,' that's literally the only song he was going to do. Tony and Bernard Edwards have never heard of him, they don't know his music, or who he is, and the rest is history. We mention to him that we'd recorded 'Bang A Gong' and he says, 'Oh, I'd like to have a crack at that,' so he has a crack at it, Bernard says, 'Look, this is great, why don't we do the whole album with him?" Filling in a few of the gaps in the story; the Taylors became acquainted with Thompson whilst the drummer was working with Bowie during the Serious Moonlight tour. And it was through him, that the Taylors were introduced to fellow Chic-ite bassist Bernard Edwards, who produced the Power Station album. Also briefly involved was Psychedelic Furs' saxophonist Mars Williams, who Duran Duran had initially approached to join their live band. As the Furs were currently off the road, Williams was keen, but by the time the details were worked out, Duran Duran decided to take a break as well. But John now had an equally good offer for the saxophonist, to come and play on the Power Station album. Williams had recently worked with Billy Idol, and thus was acquainted with his guitarist and drummer, Steve Stevens and Tommy Price. Duran Duran and Billy Idol and co. were also friends, and partied frequently together. This led to Williams renting studio time fbr everyone to jam. "Wait, check this out!" Williams enthusiastically insists. This band would never fly, because there was too many egos involved: Mick Ronson, Andy Taylor, Steve Stevens, Tommy Price, John Taylor and me." Sadly, none of this material has ever seen the light of day. However, Williams did play occasional shows in N.Y.C under a variety of monikers, which featured an ever changing line-up of friends, including the aforementioned studio jammers, as well as Tim and Richard Butler and Paul Garristo from the Furs. He remembers one show at the Limelight at which John, Andy and Ronson all played. Ian Hunter took the mike at another gig, Billy Idol at another, Richard Butler at yet another, Williams' shows were a revolving supergroup.

Meanwhile, back in February; 1985, the Power Station made their live debut on Saturday Night Live, then John and Andy flew back to Britain to receive the Best British Music Video award at the BRIT's for "Wild Boys." The following month, "The Reflex" garnered International Hit of the Year at the Ivor Novello Awards held in London Just days later the band's "Save A Prayer" genuflected it way into the U.S. Top 20. Not bad for a song that had originally appeared on Rio! By the end of March, The Power Station's "Some Like It Hot" was firing up the U.K. charts to Number 14. It would land eight places higher in the U.S. that May, only to be beat by Duran Duran's "A View To A Kill" which shot its way to the top of the U.S. charts in July. In the interim, the eponymous Power Station album soared up the U.K. and U.S. charts in April. The band followed that success up with "Get It On" in June, another hit on both sides of the Atlantic. No wonder the party never ended. "There was a lot of hanging out going on," Andy recalls, "we used to hang out down in the Village [in N.YC] at Beepop and get wacked, do Power Station and fuck about. At the time we had The Power Station and Arena out at the same time, we had two bands on the go, and it was fucking nuts nuts. We were in N.Y. most of the time, really living it up, spending $500 a night, just doing stupid things. It was just a massive party all the time, I don't know how we got any work done. It was great." And although the Taylors had sworn that the Power Station would never tour, they swiftly changed their mind. "We couldn't resist it," John laughs, "...and Robert walked out 10 days before it was due to start." And former Silverhead vocalist Michael Des Barres was...very flexible. He was our agent's choice, I didn't really know him. Wayne Fortay, our agent at the time, said there's this guy, Michael Des Barres, I don't know how he knew him, but he figured he might just be available. So he called him, and he was hanging out on some movie set with Don Johnson in Shrewspolt. "Don came and sang with us in Miami, and quid pro quo, we got to be on Miami Vice. Now people can't imagine, but back I then, I really wanted to be on Miami Vice. Andy's own first choice was Paul Young, if but he wasn't available, thus depriving the world of what would have been a phenomenal funk/soul combo. The guitarist adds that he was actually the one to suggest Michael Des Barre for the tour, as he'd seen him onstage a short while before.

Somehow, the Taylors were still managing to keep all the balls in the air. From Miami Vice it was on to Live Aid, where both the Power Station and Duran Duran performed in July. "We were burning the candle," John continues "it was not a lot of fun that Power Station tour, it was not a great time for me. Halfway through the tour, it had lost a lot of its luster. You always have to be careful when you create an alternative, that the alternative doesn't become what you're creating the alternative against. You create Power Station to be the alternative to the hulking, great beast that was Duran, or you form the Neurotic Outsiders [more on them later], and the next thing you know; you're arguing over who should be doing the video. Who gives a shit? Who wants to have an argument over shit like that?" The Power Station's final single, "Communication" was released that fall, and although it made the Top 40 in the U.S' its placement was disappointing compared to its predecessors. The tour had been an equal let down, but that was less surprising, Michael Des Barres was not Robert Palmer, and even fans of the Taylors knew the difference. By the time "Communication" reached a paltry Number 75 in Britain, the band had folded.

Now it was Arcadia's turn to shine. The taster for that group's album, "Election Day," arrived In October, and climbed into both the U.K. and U.S. Top Ten. While the Power Station found Andy and John moving far afield from Duran Duran's sound, with an intriguing hybrid of funk and glamrock, "Election Day" was a sublime reaffirmation of the mothership's style. Pulling the shrouds of darkness from Duran Duran, adding shades of pop from Rio and Ragged Tiger, the single was dark electro-dance- pop at its best. Surprisingly, however, Arcadia's album, So Red The Rose, only scraped into the Top 40 in the U.K., while even in America, the album barely reached the Top 25. "I'm a really big fan of the Arcadia album, I think history will be very kind to it, it's really diverse," Rhodes insists. It was indeed an excellent album, but perhaps fans couldn't cope with that very diversity. But maybe the real reason for its comparative lack of success was that it really wasn't a pop album at all. "I think we were heading towards an almost classical style actually," Le Bon confirms, "slightly classical, slightly jazzy, things like 'Lady Ice, it wasn't rock music, that's for sure! No, it wasn't. It was a mature album, which successfully explored a variety musical styles and influences. But even the allure of Sting singing back-up vocals on the exquisite 'The Promise," couldn't pull that single higher than Number 37 in the U.K. the only plausible explanation is perhaps Arcadia were maturing musically faster than their audience. But Rhodes is right, history will be kind to the album, and hopefully fans will actively begin seeking it out.

Arcadia certainly had a wonderful time recording it. Done in France, the album gave the band the opportunity to work with a dizzying number of guest singers and musicians, from Herbie Hancock to Grace Jones, who provided the spoken bits on "Election Day," and pretty much everyone in between. And that was what was most liberating for Rhodes, finally having the opportunity to play with other people. In early 1986, John was approached to write the theme for the movie 9 112 Weeks. In April, his solo effort for the film, "I Do What I Do," charted on both sides of the 'Atlantic. And then came the bombshell Roger announced he wanted another year off and returned to his Gloucestershire home. Stunned, the quartet began working or their next album in June without him. And then Andy walked out. "I know they were shocked when I said wanted to step out of it, but all I wanted to do was take six months off, that's all. When you're at that point in your career, these bastards want product, product, product They don't care who it is, what it is, how it is, as long as it's got the name on it, and they can flog it. You always feel that on you to point until you feel, 'Hey, I've written 19, 20, including Power Station, consecutive hits [close, actually 16], five consecutive multi- platinum albums including Arena, what more do you fucking want from me?' "I only do this because I enjoy it, I do it for fun. I studied an instrument since I was six, and I was able to make my life something I enjoyed by it. When that was all gone, why should I be taking $40 off the public each night when I'm just fucking hating it? I'm not doing that to people, I refuse to work under those circumstances. That's what people were asking us to do, bang another record out, fuck it, sell it, take the money and run."

Of course they were, that's the label's job. And record companies understand the importance of quickly following up success with new product. What they don't under- stand is a band member who's just exhausted by it all. The side projects were meant to be a happy compromise, give the label product, yet in another new, exciting, fun setting. But as much fun as the Power Station was, it came with its own headaches too. Some break! But a new Duran Duran album was needed, it had been over two years since Ragged Tiger, an eternity in the life of a "teen band." Surely, their audience would soon outgrow the band, so in the label's mind, it really was now or never. In which case, for Andy, it was never. The rest of the band tried to talk him round, a difficult proposition as to a certain extent they all felt the same way. But lawyers started coming down waving contracts, studio time was already booked, and tempers began to fray. And that just pushed the guitarist over the edge. "If someone says to me I'm not being hard working, I'm being disloyal and foolish, and I know I'm not, that I'm trying to put it on a logical footing, and they're just taking cheap shots. Yeah? Well fucking see how you do without me. Bye." With time, the anger's ebbed away, and the hurt feelings have soothed. At the time, it seemed neither was possible. "So, I left the band, and what do you do when you leave a band? Well the best place to go is L.A., hang out for a couple of years, do a John Lennon, get slung out of bars like Harry Nilson, and do nothing. "Then they come along and say, do a solo record. Gosh... telephone them, it's worth big money, what would be $5 million now. You spend all your life trying to have a value on your head, then someone comes along, and you go, WelI, if the fool's want to give it to me, I'll take it.' Oh yeah, but you've got to make a record," Andy laughs. "I didn't start the leaving process in my mind because I wanted to become a solo act, and you may have noticed I didn't particularly pursue it for very long. It sort of happened, came along, well it's going to pay for the party, I thought I was into it at the time, but later on down the line, I believe I felt I was kind of treading water I guess." And treading with him was ex-Sex Pistol Steve Jones. "If you saw him play in the studio, this is the thing, he can play rhythm guitar and just rock on it like no-one else can," Andy enthuses. "I wanted to have that. In those times, if I wanted it, I would go and find a way to get it, because I was bloody minded about things. I wanted to have Steve Jones on my album, so I've got to fix Steve Jones up. I've got a big organization, I've got loads of money, I can do whatever I want, I can sort him out. But what you realize is you can't change people."

The sorting out was hard enough. Andy had crossed paths with the guitarist in the past, when Jones was well into the L.A. party life, and deeply involved in drugs and drink Now he was 30 days into sobriety, flat broke, without even a guitar. Andy took him down to an L.A. music shop, bought him one, and gave him a year's wages ($50,000) to sort himself out with. Then the two began work on Thunder. The end result was pretty disappointing, as its lowly chart placement reflected. It wasn't in any way a bad album, it was merely that Andy had the potential for so much more. "At the end I was happy with it, it's not something that now I'd say..... there's a couple of songs on there I quite like, but..." Incidentally, this was not Andy's first solo outing, he'd already composed and recorded "Take It Easy," for the soundtrack of American Anthem. The guitarist did however, return to the fold briefly, well, the Arcadia fold, to perform on the British music show "The Tube" in July, '3 in support of the group's fourth single "The Flame."

Meanwhile, Duran Duran themselves were in chaos. "Andy announced he was leaving and then Roger who following the guitarist's announcement by also formally quitting the group, and it was so shocking," Rhodes begins. "Andy just wasn't into it, his heart wasn't into it, and he only played on a few tracks." Soon after his departure, the remaining members were contacted by guitarist Warren Cuccurullo, whose own band, Missing Persons had recently folded. And he kept contacting them, until finally Duran Duran invited him out to N.Y., tried him out and brought him in for the rest of Notorious recording. "We didn't initially see him as a member of the band," Rhodes explains, "but that changed." The other change was the arrival of new drummer Steve Ferrone, who'd previously played with Brian Auger and the Average White Band. Even so, John had his doubts about the viability of the group."I was sort of ready to leave as well, at least I thought I was. But Nick was in New York, and we sat and talked. I don't know what drew me back and once I was back, then it was not an easy road, and I became one with the fight; Holy shit, we're fighting for our survival. We're fighting to keep Duran Duran in the hearts and minds of any audience. It seemed to me over the next, five years, over the making of Notorious, Big Thing, Liberty, we were trying to keep an identity and keep an audience, just fighting to stay relevant. "Times change and Notorious was our weakest album at that point, because we lost the musician of the band. Although we did the fashionably right thing, which was replace him with Nile Rodgers, and created a video that was really stylish, we'd lost something. It was at a time that we needed it to be our best work, and it wasn't, it was too inconsistent. We were searching around for an identity, we were two men down, and that's what it's about as far as I could see. "I think there was a lot of things that were successful about the Power Station, the organic quality of the sound, that I wanted to bring to Duran Duran. That what's I was trying to do by bringing in Steve Ferrone. In the light... we had a lot of horns on that album, it was like more of a Power Station. And what I had going for me in the arguments was, 'Hey you guys had Arcadia, it didn't work, I did Power Station, it worked. Let's take the lessons I learned in Power Station and apply them, use those as the paste to give the band a new direction.' But I don't think Simon was ever comfortable with that." Indeed he wasn't, although he wasn't willing to admit. this at first. "It wasn't a lot of fun making that album," Le Bon says. We had a lot of meetings with lawyers [to sort out the situation with the departing members]I from which Nile Rodgers would drag us out, 'OK, You've had enough of that, do some music now.' He really held that album together, and he became a member of Duran Duran for that whole period, absolutely and completely. God bless him, he really, really gave himself to Duran Duran and he was just really so generous with himself, his talent, his good will, and great nature, he really held that thing together."

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