| Kicking off their U.S. tour on the West Coast, Duran Duran held a
fabulously informative press conference that you should all remember. Here is part two of
a series of articles that will bring you most of this memorable event. Q: How did you guys get involved with Russell Mulcahy in your videos?
(Nick) He, in fact, did our very first video, "Planet Earth," when we were
introduced to him and that was at a time when we didn't know very much about videos and he
was very up and coming and he did that one. We switched around a little between a couple
of other directors Godly and Crème and a guy called Perry Hines who did "Careless
Memories" which we weren't very pleased with, so we reverted back to Russell. At the
moment Russell's tied up with his first film Razor's Back, so he didn't do the last video,
but I'm sure we'll be working with him in the future.
Q: There's been such a lengthy interchange between styles based in
Europe and the U.S., the Beatles had their American influences?
(Simon) Oh sure, For starters, there's a kind of funky element in our music which is
pretty well based, well it started over here.
(Nick) Also I think that the Rio album had a lot of impressions of the first time we were
in America.
(Simon) I play baseball.
Q: When you guys did the Rio album, were you frustrated for a long
time? It took about 40 weeks for that album to get into the charts.
(John) It was crazy. I think the funniest thing was when we were touring here last time
and every week the charts would come out and we'd say if it didn't go down this week we're
going, we're leaving and it still went down, it was going down to 165, 170.
(All) And we stayed!
(John) And I think that was the funniest thing then to have gone away. We finished the
tour in like four months and then all of a sudden the single started to happen and the
album started to happen - hey, maybe we shouldn't tour here.
(Everyone) Maybe we should stay home!
Q: When will you do solo projects?
(John) When the band breaks up.
(Andy) When we get a couple of days off.
(Simon) I'll let you know that's not true.
Q: Are there any scandals about the band you don't want anyone to
know?
(Simon) If there were, we wouldn't tell you!
(Andy) John wears ladies' knickers!
Q: In your album Seven and The Ragged Tiger and the song "Tiger
Tiger" how does the tiger fit into Duran Duran?
(Simon) We like having the tiger fit into Duran Duran. If you want to know what the title
was all about, the album title is an adventure story, that's what the album is about, an
adventure story. We've kind of paralleled the adventure story to our own and the tiger is
just a symbol for luck and chance and success.
Q: How did you come up with the name Duran Duran?
(Nick) It came from a film, a '60's science fiction film called Barbarella and there was a
character in the film called Duran Duran, he was in fact an evil sex fiend, just like
Nick!
Q: But why did you choose the name?
(Roger) It didn't really mean anything; we just liked the sound of it.
(Nick) It was individual. It could become us; we didn't want a name that meant anything
else.
Q: Why is it that when Boy George wears make-up he could get away
with it and you didn't?
(Nick) Because we didn't wear such gaudy colors as he.
Q: How much pre-production do you do for the records?
(Simon) We get a lot of extra singers in to do the vocals.
Q: Does it ever bother you that the audience is often times largely
made up of 14 year old girls more interested in screaming at you?
(Andy) Actually that's in a way wrong in a sense, I mean you may notice the screaming 14
and 15 year old girls, but I imagine a chap our age wouldn't be quite so hysterical and
throw knickers and bras on the stage, and they more often than not sit in the seats
farther back and don't all run to the front and do all this. But we've noticed over here
there has been a large male audience, but obviously not screaming as much.
Q: Is there a difference between the audiences here and in England?
(John) We were actually starting to get a bit blasé about the reactions of our audiences
until we got to Seattle, and the audiences here have been ridiculous.
Q: Are you ever gonna use any women in your videos that are dressed?
(All) No, Why?
(Andy) He's not a male chauvinist; he's just a pig.
Q: Of all the places that you've made videos, which is your
favorite?
(Nick) Definitely, London.
(Andy) Home, it's relaxing.
(Nick) I mean, everybody thinks they look really glamorous and everything, but I tell you
when I was on the yacht in Antigua doing the "Rio" Video, I never felt so sick
in my life!
Q: John, during the time when you were getting the band together,
did you feel inadequate that the band members weren't just right?
(John) With the people that we had originally formed the band with? No, they actually felt
we were inadequate. That is why they left.
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