Duran Duran Return With an Album

After close to 20 years with Capitol/EMI record label (Duran started on their Harvest label back in 1980), the band was dropped and left out in the cold after their last studio album called Medazzaland failed to meet expectations coupled with the loss of founding member bassist John Taylor just prior to the release in 1997.

However, Capitol might not want them now but they currently are rehashing every last bit of profit they can get out of Duran's back catalogue by releasing "Night Versions" (fabo remixes of the hits) and the latest "Greatest" (a greatest hit CD including the post-'80s minor hits).

The remainder of the band - egomaniac lead singer Simon LeBon and the last original member keyboardist Nick Rhodes and the official post-Andy Taylor guitarist for almost 10 years, Warren Cuccurullo - are still trying to make it happen.

It is almost official the band has signed with Hollywood Records (a division of Disney) via a Nick Rhodes interview on 8/18/99. Duran Duran has been hard at work with their new CD, tentatively titled Pop Trash (previously entitled Hallucinating Elvis). This CD is expected to be released in early 2000 after the millenium madness and when the ink is dry according to Nick Rhodes.

If you are a good '80s music reader, you would know that the band is on a promotional tour called the "Let It Flow" tour taken from a poem that Nick wrote, until the first week of September. Duran Duran features 4 new songs on the tour; there are: Hallucinating Elvis, Pop Trash Movie (orginially written for Blondie's "No Exit" CD), Lava Lamp and Someone Else Not Me. Other songs include Aphrodisiac and Last Day On Earth.

As for the official status of the CD, it is "almost finished" though it may now be in the can.  Maybe this time around, there will be label support and encouragement for the Duran camp. The boys usually need to be kicked in the nether regions for them to do proper publicity. Duran Duran themselves sometimes have the bad karma to make bad career decisions (example: Thank You album, a collections of covers after their comeback album in 1993).

When the band was dropped, it may have been the best thing for them. Now they can go on another label with the staff, excitement, money and capability to handle Duran.

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