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Roger Taylor
(March 2008 Issue)
Rolling On The Red Carpet It shouldn’t really be much of a surprise that Justin Timberlake, Timbaland, and Nate “Danja” Hills all have production credits on Duran Duran’s new album, Red Carpet Massacre. After all, the band’s four founding members–keyboardist Nick Rhodes, singer Simon Le Bon, bassist John Taylor, and drummer Roger Taylor–all original members (guitarist Andy Taylor declined to participate on the record)–have continuously been on the cutting edge of contemporary sound since their debut, twenty-nine years ago.
Roger Taylor describes the drum sounds on the new record as “A mixture of programming along with me playing a Roland V-Drum kit. We also mixed in quite a bit of organic drums. It’s a real mish-mash of everything.”
During the past three decades, the group–who People magazine at one time crowned “the prettiest band in rock”–has placed twenty-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 and thirty on the Top 40 of the UK singles chart. The band has sold more than eighty-five million records, and they’ve won two Grammy Awards.
Duran Duran recently debuted their much-anticipated CD with a two-week run of shows on Broadway in New York City, playing post hits and tunes from the new recording. Taylor, who has always combined acoustic drums with electronics, again brought his studio wizardry to the stage. “I have my Tama acoustic kit set up in front of me,” Taylor describes, “so I’ll play some of the songs very organically on the ‘real’ kit. And for the first time, I’ve also got my full Roland TD-20 V-Drum kit set up to my left. I’m also triggering samples from the album.”
For more of MD’s interview with Roger, see the Caught In The Web section of www.moderndrummer.com. And for more on the band, visit www.duranduran.com.
Billy Amendola
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