Critics, who never liked us in the first place, say we’re trying to gain respectability. But we’re not kids anymore, and we had songs that we wanted to record that I don’t think are in the teen-idol genre. “I love all those kids who came to our shows and screamed for us and cheered us on. “We decided they couldn’t be replaced, so we decided to go ahead by ourselves. “When Roger and Andy decided it’d be best all-around if they quit the band, Simon and Nick and I had the option of disbanding, remaining a trio or replacing them,” Taylor said. John Taylor attributes part of the group’s newfound maturity to the departure of the two other Taylors. (He will open for Heart on Friday at Poplar Creek and Saturday at Alpine Valley.) And Andy, who liked the live-wire guitar playing he did with the Power Station, left to pursue a solo career. Roger Taylor left, saying he couldn’t handle the stress of being in a rock band anymore.
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Two members, however, decided they had enough. “I don’t think any of us had any intention at that time of leaving the band.” “Those were just side projects, and we all knew it,” said John Taylor, who also penned the title track of “9 1/2 Weeks” and made his acting debut in “Timeslip” on the Cinemax pay-cable station. LeBon, Rhodes and drummer Roger Taylor, no relation to John or Andy, retaliated by forming Arcadia. When John and Andy Taylor collaborated with vocalist Robert Palmer and drummer Tony Thompson to form the Power Station, the subsequent hits “Some Like It Hot” and “Bang a Gong” gave the Taylors better reviews than they had with Duran Duran.
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In 1985, fans worried the group might break up for good. It won’t bother me if a girl buys our record ’cause she likes the way we look, but I’d prefer that people talked about us for our music.” We still like to look good, but we’re not ridiculous about it. Personally, I think we’ve grown up immensely musically. But it’s been more than 10 years since then and I’m 27 now. “We were very young and impressionable when we started the group,” said John Taylor in a phone interview from New York. The group’s former guitarist, Andy Taylor (no relation to John), has said it was a relief to leave Duran Duran because he didn’t have to worry about what to wear or how he should style his hair. Self-proclaimed clotheshorses, Duran Duran’s members spent almost as much time deciding what to wear as what to play. Duran Duran – then a quintet – was a natural for the MTV generation. The band members’ square-jawed good looks translated well on video, making their image the main course and their bouncy pop tunes the dessert. Duran Duran’s self-titled debut album and followup, “Rio,” did poorly on the national album charts until MTV began showing the group’s exotic videos. Had it not been for MTV, the 24-hour cable music station, Duran Duran might never have become a superstar group in the United States. After several solo and new group projects (Power Station, Arcadia), Duran Duran is now a trio consisting of Taylor, vocalist Simon LeBon and keyboardist Nick Rhodes.
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While the members are eager to present themselves as the new, mature and pared-down Duran Duran to the press, it’s likely that a good number of teeny-boppers will attend the band’s show Wednesday at Poplar Creek Music Theatre in Hoffman Estates. “It’s really been kind of nice because not only do we have newer, older fans, but we still have a lot of our fans from seven years ago. “There haven’t been as many screamers at our shows as in the past,” said bassist John Taylor, one of the heartthrobs in the British pop band Duran Duran.