Duran Duran put plan B into orbit

1.00pm - By REBECCA BARRY

Last year Duran Duran embarked on a world tour, playing second fiddle to Robbie Williams when they came to Auckland.

Now Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes, John Taylor, Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor have reunited to release a new album.

This latest release comes 25 years after they first formed.

How did you find the gig last year?

Well, we weren't closing the show and I prefer to close the show. It was better than nothing but I really, really want to come back to New Zealand and play our own show.

It was a good exercise, playing those shows with Robbie, and we spent the last three years really building our brand back up again. And part of that process has been going out on the road, in some cases playing arenas, and in the case of Auckland and Australia we actually opened up for some young upstart. But it was good for us. I remember we went back to the hotel in Auckland after the show and we were all just so angry. I don't know that the pop kids need to know this, but you enter into something like that and somebody says to you, "No no, it's going to be a double bill. More people are interested in seeing you than Robbie."

And then you get there and Robbie's logo is above the stage and you've got six foot on the lip of the stage to squeeze your equipment in, y'know? And I know that I've been around. I was just fooling myself that it was going to be any different.

But it's okay. We got through those shows without killing him or anybody and we were all the stronger for it.

Why the tour and album now?

I needed to get away from the band. I left about nine years ago. I really needed to lay down some roots and work by myself for a while. Having done that, I was in a better state of mind for coming back. It gave me a renewed sort of vigour. I can't really speak for anybody else.

But so much has happened in the course of making this record. The second period of writing was in London and I arrived in London the day of 9/11. The music industry has been like shifting sands, like shifting deckchairs on the Titanic. It's an extraordinary tale of the music business, just what Duran Duran have been through in the past three years in order to get a deal.

It was kind of plan B in a way, but it worked out beautifully and we've made a record that we're all proud of and everybody's getting along better than ever.

Can we expect classic Duran Duran this time round?

Yeah, very much. We can all walk away from this writing and recording process, which has been three years, feeling that each of us is well represented and that we've made the best album we could possibly make at this point in our lives.

You've been referred to time and again as the quintessential 80s band. How do you stay relevant?

Obviously people remember us at the point at which we had the most impact, which was in the early 80s. But we made a record at the beginning of the 90s that gave us some currency in the following decade. I think the biggest challenge will be for this record to connect with an audience in this new decade. I guess people are always going to think of us as an 80s band. I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

We're not thinking about the kids or the grown-ups or the marketplace. We're just trying to combine our shared expertise and make the best possible songs we can make.

Who are your biggest fans now?

The people who came up to me and say, "You made my teenage years bearable." When you've been a midwife to an adolescent, like Bowie was for me, or Joe Strummer was for me ... I mean he gave birth to me, to the musician. Before the Clash I was some other geezer that was scared of everybody and had no clue of where I was going in my life. So when people come up to me and say that, I know what they mean. And I think that's a pretty profound effect to have on somebody.

How does it feel to listen to contemporary bands and think, "They sound as though they've been influenced by us"?

I'm really glad to be a part of it, especially in those sort of dreary days when one is not feeling very superstar-ish. It can be comforting to hear a song by No Doubt and say, "Wow, that sounds so Duran."

What's the lifestyle like now?

Well, my home is in Los Angeles. I live there with my wife and we've got three children between us. I've spent most of this year in London working on the album, doing the British tour.

I'm on the road for the rest of this year. I shan't be going home until the middle of October and then only for a couple of days.

But I have an extraordinary life and I wouldn't trade it for anybody's. I like hotels. I like aeroplanes. It's a lifestyle that suits me. I wouldn't do it if I didn't. It's not for the fainthearted - but we've all had to learn an enormous amount about each other in the past three years and it's been a really incredible journey.

I use this as an example: Axl Rose and Slash, two key members of Guns 'n' Roses. You could not get them in a room together. It wouldn't matter how much money you offered them.

People's egos do crazy things and there's a lot of ego in our band. But we've all somehow managed to work together for the greater good - with the ghost of Winston Churchill ringing in our ears.

How far into the future do you see this going?

Well, we have an American tour planned, beginning the middle of February. It's a long tour - 10 weeks. That's the biggest tour we've ever undertaken. We've got to come back to the South Pacific, New Zealand and Australia. I'm hoping May, June.

"We're going to ride this baby as long as we can. And while we continue to get along I don't see why we shouldn't make another album after this one. Of course if it's really badly received ... You can only talk from the perspective of the moment and from this moment, I'd like to make more albums with these guys.

In your heyday you forged a reputation for your cutting-edge music videos - what was the biggest challenge you faced making videos for this market?

What we had to do was not get trendy. We had to be very careful. We made a video that's a story. It's about the band and that's the only story we need to be telling right now.

I don't think we need to be playing with our images anymore than really just saying to everybody, "Hey look, it's John, it's Andy, it's Simon." I think that's enough.

On CD

* Who: Duran Duran

* What: Album Astronaut

* Released: October 18