Some of those songs, you really have to bite them. You challenge yourself, you challenge the audience, you do something different. People weren't expecting it.
We felt if we didn't have new material in us and we didn't have a real reason to exist, then we probably wouldn't have done an 80's revival thing. We are very conscious about the fact that's what we are as a bunch of people.
The five of us don't know how to exist in any other way. We are an ambitious bunch, I guess.
From doing Power Station, it was like, it's the same guys, but it doesn't sound like them. When we were in Duran, the labels and management wanted more Duran stuff so they could sell it.
When you are younger, you are running on that pure naive adrenalin, you don't have any real responsibility aside from making sure you get there and play. And there's usually someone there to help you do that!
I don't think you need a record deal to write songs. You don't need any other reason than you want to do it. It's a far cry from why some people do music today. They make it to order, which is pretty horrible.
I discovered that it was a lonely world being a solo artist. Then I started working with another solo artist, Rod Stewart, and he used to tell me how lonely he was!
If you were looking at where you would like your career to go, then you would have to cherry pick The Stones. People love coming to see them. They are it, they are the most definitive rock n roll band ever.
It was mind-blowing. It was a small place with 2,000 standing-up tickets. It's great to have your band back and working and playing again, people have been so generous.
Melodic songs that people can relate to has always been our thing.
Music is escapism, it's entertainment.
The great thing about the Internet is that it allows people to find and consume music.
The thing about Duran... that gives you the ability to bring all that opportunity back into your life.
This is a very screwed-up business. Record labels don't sign a lot of bands these days. We just want to find a home and stay there and make records and do our thing and not have to look over our shoulder.
Those were the days, you know. It's an English thing; as soon as it's gets to 6 pm, you have to go and have a drink. We used to stick to that religiously.
To passively get up and play a bunch of old songs wouldn't have really motivated us. So we are bringing the new material into the set and it goes down really well.
We didn't just want to go out and do that whole greatest hits thing.
We had a huge audience, we sold truckloads of albums. If we do something that's cool, people will listen to it. If we don't, we would be selling people short.
We play a long show, and you can't beat yourself up too much over it, as physically you just kill yourself. It was always good fun on the road and it still is.
We wanted to get everyone back focused on the fact we are playing live again. It really does sound great.
