Going Their Own Way
Huw Collingbourne chats to Duran Duran
about stardom, society, and hot steamy nights with Simon
Le Bon.
When their first single, 'Planet Earth', brought Duran Duran
to the public's attention in the spring of 1981, a lot of
people dismissed them as a mere sub-Spandau rip-off trying
to cash in on the New Romantic craze.
'People seem to feel much happier if they can fit you into
a category.' Nick Rhodes thinks, 'In fact! the only similarity
between us and Spandau was that we both used to wear frilly
shirts . . . and I suppose our drum sounds were quite similar
too.
'But nobody makes these comparisons any more, thank goodness.
They can see now that we are very different groups. And anyway,
Spandau have now moved on to the new fad - imitation funk.
We don't want to be any part of that.'
It soon becomes clear when talking to these lads that they
would hate to be thought 'a part' of anything! When Nick
Rhodes and John Taylor formed Duran Duran in 1978, they were
determined that the band should have a unique and unmistakable
identity. To this end, the music which they played was, at
first, intentionally very up-to-date and experimental.
'Most people found it totally unacceptable,' Nick explains,
'because we had a clarinet player, a rhythm box' two bass
guitars and no lead guitar. It was very obscure. We enjoyed
it at the time but eventually we felt we had to move on to
something a bit more substantial.
Changes
During the next couple of years the band went through numerous
changes before arriving at the present line-up with John
Taylor (21) on bass, Andy Taylor (21 ) on guitar, Roger Taylor
(21 ) on drums (none of whom, incidentally, are related to
each other), Nick Rhodes (19) on synthesiser and Simon Le
Bon (23) as vocalist,
'The thing which makes us all work well together,' Nick
says, 'is that we are five very different individuals. We
all have quite strong personalities. Sometimes this fact
means that there's a lot of tension between us, because we
all have conflicting ideas. But that only seems to make us
work better.'
Simon agrees. 'I'm not a "team sport" type of person,' he says,
'And this is the only team I've felt happy in - because we're all as
good as one another and have each other's respect even when we disagree
quite strongly.'
Gay?
By their own standards, one of the greatest measures of Duran Duran's
success is the broad cross-section of people who come to their concerts.
No longer are their audiences restricted to a fashionable young 'Futurist'
following, but include everybody from 'twelve-year-old school-kids
to forty-year-old executives.'
At our last gig in Sweden the audience were practically
all gay skinheads'. Nick tells me. 'It struck us as very
peculiar because in Britain we don't seem to attract skinheads
at all.'
And gays?
'People used to think that Duran Duran had gay overtones
and must. therefore. have an enormous gay following But they
discovered that we had more of a girl following than a gay
one.
'I suppose we have adopted a certain flamboyance which,
for some reason, has always been associated with gay people,
and not everybody finds that easy to accept. But again this
is just an example of people's attempts to separate everything
into categories, to say this is gay but that isn't. It seems
very silly to me because, after all, gay people are I exactly
the same as everybody else in everything but their sexual
habits. The people who insist on this sort of separation
must have very closed minds.'
Simon has even more pronounced views on the way that people
attempt to categorise one another in recognisable social
or sexual groups.
'Society continually tries to make people conform rather
than to develop their individuality,' he says, 'It begins
when you are very young and you have to try to fulfil your
parents' expectations. After that you are forever pushed
into becoming a part of various institutions: school, church,
college and so on.
'Institutions like that cater only for he majority. They're
inflexible and cause an awful lot of pain and damage.'
Rebellious
When Simon was a child his parents wanted him to become
an actor and even now he continues to feel some resentment
at their attempts to push him in this direction irrespective
of his wishes.
'I started doing TV commercials when I was six,' he says,
'Amongst other things I was the boy with the dirty shirt
in the Persil advert.
'Then, in my teens, I went through a period of rebellion.
I finished A-levels, was a complete failure and went to Art
School for a year. I got sick of that because I don't like
Art students very much - they're so insular. Besides, it
was just another institution.'
But aren't there a lot of restrictions inherent in being
famous?
Nick answers that: 'The reverse is true,' he says, 'Fame
brings you lots of nice extras - being recognised in the
streets, seeing yourself on TV, doing interviews with your
favourite magazines, going to a nice restaurant and having
the manager turn round to you at the end of the meal and
saying "Oh, you don't have to pay for that" . .
. silly little things like that!'
Alone
But what about the loss of privacy? Surely there must be
times when you wish you could just go out into the street
like everybody else without being continually recognised
by people you've never even met.
'People in Britain are, on the whole, very considerate,'
Simon reckons, 'Even when they recognise you they don't always
encroach on your territory. They realise that there are times
when you want to be alone.
'From time to time reporters find out things about me I
wish they wouldn't. I can't blame them for wanting to do
it, though. There's nothing I'm particularly ashamed of and
it doesn't worry me what I other people think of me.
'Slowly I'm getting used to the I fact that it is no longer
possible for I me to have a private life. You have to make
a conscious decision to I give that up when you become a
public figure. You don't have any right to a private life.'
Society
Some people might think that rather a high price to pay
for fame. After all, isn't there some part of everybody's
life which they would rather keep separate from the world
at large?
'Only my sleep,' Simon says, 'I sleep a lot. And it can
be a bit of a trial when girls phone up at three o'clock
in the morning and want me to spend a few hours talking to
them or to go out for a drink or something.
'But, to put it in perspective, I think the loss of my privacy
is relatively unimportant. What is much more serious is the
way in which society affects everyone's personal freedoms.
I believe that we are now coming to a point where everything
will start to become more and more institutionalised, making
people less free to be themselves and live in the way they
wish to - or else it may start becoming de-institutionalised,
increasing people's freedoms. It could go either way - it's
all dependent upon economics and party politics.
'These are the things people should be worried about. But
it - wouldn't concern me at all whether or not Bridget Parnell
of Islington chooses to write to a popular newspaper about "My
Hot And Steamy Nights With Simon on Le Bon" - I'd find
that quite funny!'
|
