Duran Duran’s Simon Le Bon: ‘I’ve always refused to play Glastonbury’
“Mariah Carey can keep Christmas. We are staking our claim for Hallowe’en with Danse Macabre; the new soundtrack for dark mischief everywhere.” It’s an audacious bid but a convincing one, coming as it does from Duran Duran keyboardist Nick Rhodes, whose Warholian alabaster hair and otherworldly -pallor have always conveyed -Something of the Night.
“We wanted to make something playful and have fun with the high camp imagery of fright night,” he adds. “It came about after we played a Hallowe’en gig in Vegas last year and decided to really go for it; moments before the curtain went up, I was strewing roses across the stage and positioning coffins just-so to create the right ambience.”
The 13-track release (no other number would do) features three new songs and several reworkings of old ones, along with various -covers including Talking Heads’ Psycho Killer, Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones and the Billie Eilish hit Bury a Friend.
Although Hallowe’en makes for a splendid and spooky hook, I can’t help worrying that such a time--specific album is as niche as a non-fungible token.
Rhodes, 61, barks with laughter when I suggest the master copy could be shredded, like a Banksy, at the witching hour on October 31 in front of an audience dressed for a gothic masquerade.
“It sounds right up my street in terms of theatricality, but this music isn’t intended just for a single day,” he clarifies, with an unsettling grin. “These tracks are designed to conjure up a sense of mystery and drama and capture the way humans are drawn to the perverse joy of mayhem once dusk falls. We’ve all felt that.”
Have we, though? For those of us who came of age in the 1980s, the very name Duran Duran tends to trigger a chorus of Rio and glorious visions of pretty boys in Antony Price silk suits cavorting on a yacht. But then Rhodes points out they were also behind incontrovertibly edgy numbers such as Notorious and Hungry Like the Wolf, so yes, I suppose we have all felt that.
Singer Simon Le Bon, now 64, whose preternatural cheeks still possess Something of the Cherub, is less interested in the eldritch hinterland of their new recording.
“It’s a party album. Seasonal entertainment that will make you smile; simple as that.” Right. Not sure he has read the memo. But then Le Bon goes on to explain in expansive detail how he adopted the Hijaz – a mysterious-sounding scale that hails from the Middle East – for his vocals on the cover version of Bury a Friend.
“I can’t tell you how much we respect Billie Eilish and her approach to music; she’s -completely invented a whole new genre of vocalisation,” he says.
“I didn’t want to sound like Simon Le Bon doing a bad impersonation of Billie Eilish, I wanted to create something that was unique but recognisably Duran Duran, and I hope I’ve done that.”
Anyone surprised to learn of this crossover would probably be equally taken aback by their -musical collaborations with Justin Timberlake and Janelle Monáe and Midas-touch producers such as Mark Ronson and Timbaland. Industry behemoth Nile Rodgers produced new single, Dark Moonlight, which they performed this week on The Graham Norton Show.
Slick, schlocky and damn good fun, Danse Macabre is their 16th album and was made in a breathless six weeks during a break in touring. It was forged from the same -crucible of “artistic conflict” as all their other work, which sounds quite shouty, although Rhodes insists he and the rest of the band operate with the precision of a SWAT team once they get into a studio.
Hailing from Birmingham, the lineup of Rhodes, Le Bon, John Taylor on bass, Roger Taylor on drums and intermittent guitarist Andy Taylor swept onto the music scene in 1981 to the strains of their debut single Planet Earth. It was fast and rhythmic with zig-zagging guitar, a shimmering synthesizer, the melody and counter-melody elegantly interchangeable. They didn’t look too shabby, either.
In the years since, they have sold more than 100 million albums and garnered gongs including eight Lifetime Achievement Awards, two Grammys, two Ivor Novellos and two Brit Awards. They’ve bagged a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and, in 2022, were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
Their anthemic Planet Earth is currently being used in a quirky BBC video featuring Sir David Attenborough, in which decades of archive footage have been edited so he appears to recite the lyrics.
“It’s cute,” agrees Rhodes. “If only we’d known, we’d have invited Sir David into the studio and recorded something. He’s the -definition of a national treasure.”
It’s an epithet that could easily be applied to Duran Duran. Rolling Stone magazine said of their 2021 album: “If you heard Future Past in a blindfold test, you might guess it was some hot young hipster band out to conquer the planet. But it’s Duran Duran, who conquered it four decades ago.” Earlier this year, when they toured sold-out arena shows across the UK, their performance was described as “decadent and bombastic” in these very pages.
High praise indeed. Yet for a number of cynics and what used to be pejoratively termed Duranies, (mea culpa) the band remains -forever trapped in the nostalgic amber of their early days. Complete with hair spray, bandanas and shoulder pads, the sweetly melodic tones of Save a Prayer (released a full 41 years ago, folks) and the dramatic opening chords of Is There Something I Should Know? ushered in the reign of the New Romantics that was balm to the soul of my post-punk generation.
When I admit that I’ve not exactly kept up over the decades, Rhodes and Le Bon are magnanimous. It turns out that regardless of your knowledge of their back catalogue, if you self-identify as a Duran Duran fan, then that’s what you are.
“People’s priorities change as they age,” observes Rhodes philosophically. “You cut back on your outlay on music because you want other things, like a new sofa.” As Rhodes has a passion for Neapolitan Baroque paintings, I can’t begin to imagine where he buys his furnishings.
Le Bon is similarly phlegmatic. Both agree that it’s during their live shows that they draw in converts. The key, however, is compromise.
Anyone who has ever suffered an artist’s self-indulgent insistence on playing endless amounts of new material (you know who you are) will understand there are few more heart-sinking phrases than “this next one’s from the latest album”.
“I know!” cries Rhodes with entirely unexpected empathy. “What a terrible thing to do to the people who have paid to see you live and hear all those big songs they love!”
Le Bon concurs. “A live show is like a retrospective exhibition at an art gallery. If you’ve come to see a Monet blockbuster you want the Water Lilies, of course you do. Duran Duran are lucky because we have an awful lot of Water Lilies we can bring out.”
Their mathematical rule of thumb (which arguably ought to be enshrined in law) is that two thirds of any concert should be devoted to absolute bangers and the remaining third for new material, the odd cheeky cover and “esoterica” – and before you worry about the latter, rest assured you’ll know it when you hear it.
“Our track Secret Oktober 31st on Danse Macabre started life long ago as a B-side of Union of the Snake, but gained traction as a closet favourite among fans, so we decided to rework it; the thing about having such a wealth of material to draw upon is we can go back and bring new perspective to things.”
Perspective comes with age – and with it, perhaps the recognition that the band wouldn’t get away with some of their 1980s skits today. Their video for 1981 single Girls on Film featured half-naked models rubbing champagne-bucket ice cubes on their bare nipples. “No way would it be made now,” says Rhodes. “But I don’t believe in -re-writing history or getting -retrospectively offended.”
Le Bon once featured in a Jim’ll Fix It stunt when he arrived at a teenage girl’s school, dressed as a knight on a white charger. He carried her off in his arms and broke a million teenage hearts. (It was a lot more innocent than it sounds.)
“His bizarre tracksuit-with-bling-and-horrible-straggly-hair persona was a real anomaly and seemed very fake,” recalls Le Bon of Jimmy Savile. “We all heard the rumours, although we never saw anything. But sometimes I wonder if that makes us as guilty as those close to him, who had their suspicions but never investigated any further.”
Recently, the band have had to confront mortality, too. Guitarist Andy Taylor, who has played with and walked away from Duran Duran on several occasions, was due to join them from his home in Ibiza last November for their induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. But just days before their appearance the band received a letter from Taylor revealing that he had been diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer. “Although my current condition is not immediately life-threatening,” he wrote, “there is no cure.”
“It was utterly shocking, we had no idea,” says Le Bon. Taylor’s bandmates were left deeply upset and broke the news to fans by reading out part of the letter at the event.
The band recently played a -benefit gig in Silicon Valley to raise funds for the Cancer Awareness Trust, which supports state-of-the-art treatment available for Taylor and others battling the condition.
“Andy is currently asymptomatic, which is incredible,” says Le Bon. “With cancer you never know quite what is going to happen, but it is amazing to know that right now he’s in remission.”
Remarkably, despite his ill health, Taylor picked up the guitar for Danse Macabre when Le Bon and a sound engineer flew to Ibiza.
“It was extraordinary,” recalls the singer. “Andy has always been the most innovative, intuitive player and in three days was able to play on 10 of the songs. It was a genuine privilege to witness it.”
Le Bon’s wife, Yasmin, a model and mother of their three adult daughters (whisper it but he’s also a grandfather of two) came out to Spain with them. In recent years, she has also joined her husband on tour, which he appreciates.
“When we’re touring, my day job is to keep myself in peak vocal, physical and mental condition. Last time we did 21 shows in 36 days which is a very busy schedule and so having Yasmin come with me really helps a lot.
“In the old days I’d perform to 30,000 people and then go back to the hotel room with a couple of -bottles of wine or a bottle of Mezcal and drink until I was in a stupor because it was the only way to get to sleep. I’d wake up in the middle of the night and feel terrible.
“When Yasmin’s there I don’t drink anything like as much and she quite rightly doesn’t let me order cheese fondues. It’s a sad but inescapable fact that my cheese fondue days are over.”
A 21st-century rock and roll -epitaph if ever there were one. But Le Bon and the lads have no plans to ease up. For now they are planning 2024, which will include -appearances at festivals – although (appallingly!) not the only festival that matters: Glastonbury.
“I believe they have our telephone number, we haven’t changed it” quips Rhodes. Le Bon elaborates that they have been approached to play but the offer has never been quite right: “3pm in the Disco Tent isn’t really where we see ourselves.”
“A long time ago I vowed I would never set foot in Glastonbury unless it was on the Pyramid Stage at a decent hour of the night,” he says. “So although I’ve been asked to camp, to glamp and invited to fly in and out by helicopter, I’ve always refused on principle.”
It does seem to be a glaring omission, but the Rolling Stones, whose debut album came out in 1964, waited half a century to get the call, in 2013. All the same it would be an outrage if Duran Duran’s Wild Boys were kept waiting much longer.
“The media always labels us, but we simply don’t fit into any pigeonhole. Anyone who sees our shows knows that Duran Duran isn’t just a band for the Eighties. We are a band for life.”
Danse Macabre by Duran Duran (Tape Modern/BMG) is released on October 27