Mark Ronson seems like a good person to produce him. Hopefully Macca and Ronson's collaboration it'll be finished by the time Duran Duran are ready to get back in the studio with him next year. From what they said when talking about working with him on the All You Need is Now album, and they praised him to the high heavens, is that he's very knowledgeable about music and has a firm hand without being overly bossy, which sounds like something that's good for a producer of McCartney as well. He just sounds like a really good producer to work with, with a positive attitude who wants to get the best out of the songwriters/bands rather than making them have one particular "Ronson sound".

I was such a new wave chick back in the 80's. There used to be a syndicated radio show called "Rock over London" that had all the latest hits and gossip from the UK. And of course I read Smash Hits. MTV introduced tons of British bands. It's so weird realizing there was no internet to find stuff out back then. I'm so used to it now that I can't even remember my life without it. But it was all magazines and MTV and any scrap of info or gossip you could get your hands on. Duran Duran were my all time favorites but others were Tears for Fears Thompson Twins Depeche Mode Eurythmics U2 INXS(an Aussie band) Howard Jones There were a lot of others but I can't remember most of them right now. Soft Cell(Tainted Love), Human League(Don't You Want Me) and Flock of Seagulls(I Ran) were actually the first "new wave" hits I remember hearing. And I was still very into Paul up until the mid 80s as well, having gotten into The Beatles and Paul when I was about 8 or 9. So Paul was still very much a presence in my 80's musical experience.

Is Ronson supposed to be working with Macca? I hadn't heard that. That would be interesting to hear. He's apparently a very good producer, in the sense of guiding but not getting in the way of the artists. He'll tell the truth but he's not mean about it. The members of Duran Duran say he made them feel very good about themselves--yet he obviously didn't kiss their asses in the sense of letting them keep things that weren't very good, he made them do things over if he thought they weren't up to snuff.

herc:

this is a big picture to post it here,i'll give you the link,it's a beautiful photo from Paul's new album kisses on the bottom,set it as your desktop like i did,one of the best photos that Paul has taken since years http://www.rocksquare.com/blog/wp-content/rs_uploads/Paul-Kisses-on-the-Bottom.jpg

I agree, it's a great picture of him.

Thanks to a Duran Duran site I was looking at, I came across this really cute picture of Paul from it looks like early 2011 or late 2010, I think Paul actually looks rather young in this pic, despite the goofy face(or perhaps because of the goofy face). It's our Paul, Simon Le Bon and Ben Stiller doing "Blue Steel"(Stiller's male model character in Zoolander's "signature pose") https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/419763_2946250569940_1071559994_33012035_1645356630_n.jpg credit to Salvo at duranasty.com Stiller's the only one doing it right(he did originate it LOL), Paul's looks extra goofy and Simon looks like he's trying to stop himself laughing. I notice it looks like Paul's holding a martini? Wonder if it was shaken or stirred. I just kind of love the idea that Paul has very possibly seen Zoolander, that movie cracks me up.

lazydynamite88:

im surprised 'le bon' never insisted on coming back the next day to re-do his embarrasing moment.....'mccartney' certainly did!

Well, they weren't Paul McCartney. He's always an exception. lol Actually I doubt they even thought of it at the time. They were all involved in other projects and running off in different directions afterwards to finish them up. Anyway, did you listen to any of the links I provided, nice mix of old songs and new songs, audience taken videos(except Dream Boys and Crystal Ship), no studio "trickery" involved--so....can he sing?

audi:

Simon LeBon has taken VERY good care of his voice.

And the MSG and O2 Arena stuff I linked to is AFTER he and the band had a huge scare during the summer where the entire upper 1/3 of his range just disappeared(he lost almost a whole octave). In the end, whatever caused it, was something even most of the specialists hadn't seen or had seen very rarely as it took weeks to get something resembling a proper diagnosis and it took almost 4 months to get it back, including vocal therapy.

I checked my Live Aid DVD tracklist -- "A View To A Kill" is NOT on it. No wonder I wasn't aware of it.

LOL Yeah funny how that worked out, I just assume they begged Bob Geldof(or whomever put the DVD together) to leave it off. Because, dayum....bum notes really don't come any bigger than that.

lazydynamite88:

they would have been dangerous if 'le bon' could actually sing!. infact the recentish single 'ordinary world' was suprisingly good. still cant get over that 'high note' le bon tried to hit during the american leg of 'live aid'....'duran' were in their prime then aswel,a really bad moment infront of millions in 1985,reminds me,who else had a train wreck infont of millions that day????anyone we know?

Le Bon CAN actually sing. He's 53 years old and sounds almost exactly like he did in the 80's, except maybe better because he has more power and control now. He's not Pavarotti, but he's a pop singer, he doesn't need to be Pavarotti. His voice may not be everyone's cup of tea but IMO he sounds better live than many rock and pop artists do. That Live Aid bum note was a doozy and couldn't have happened at a worse time(god knows Duranies around the world still cringe at the memory of it) but it was just a bum note, it can happen to anyone. Here's the MSG 2011 version:

, no bum note on "need". The band is a fantastic live act. For the nervous fellas in the crowd 2011: SXSW 2011: [second](]The Chauffeur[/url] (and a [url= in 1995(just Simon and Warren Cuccurullo on acoustic guitar) A rocker: New album vocal focused, MSG 2011: [The Man Who Stole a Leopard](]Before The Rain[/url] and [url= Oh and a very rare thing indeed, a Simon Le Bon solo song, only about 4 of them have ever seen the light of day over the past 25 years--but I think this quite a pretty song: , 1998, just Simon and an acoustic guitar.

I saw these guys in concert not too long ago at Madison Square Garden and they are still amazing. They were my teenage crush(loved Simon Le Bon--and I loved that long Wild Boys haircut too, it looked really good on him--he got me reading poetry and books I might not ever have read so see, teenage crushes can be good for your intellect, nyah!;P)--and had all my walls plastered with magazine pin ups and posters of the band, there wasn't a square inch free. I saw that Rio thing, if anyone has Netflix, it's available for streaming now. It's worth buying though, it's called "Classic Albums: Rio" http://www.amazon.com/Duran-Classic-Albums-Rio/dp/B001G7EGOM and it's only about $5 US dollars for the DVD. Their most recent album, All You Need is Now, is terrific. Produced by Mark Ronson. It's really worth checking out(with the understanding that they obviously are not making a hard rock album or a folky album, they make often fun funky pop music with a bit of a dark side). Some people find the atonal sythesizer sound on the title track during the verses hard to love even though it's got a really catchy, soaring chorus but I loved it because I don't have a problem with some atonal sounds(oddly because Macca's used some atonal sounds from time to time and helped me to appreciate their usefulness in building up towards a melodic "explosion") and the lyrics to the song are a really upbeat, nice tribute to the relationship between the band and the fans who have gone along for the ride, either for part of or the whole trip. "Girl Panic!" is just plain fun, "Before the Rain" is haunting and dramatic and a perfect album closer(and believe it or not, a great concert opener), "The Man Who Stole a Leopard" is a twisted tale indeed. And, in a move that would make many of us McCartney fans jealous, they play about 5 or 6 NEW album songs in concert and the new songs generally get a good response--not like the old ones of course but that's natural, they are new(but of course just to show that fans are never happy, just like McCartney fans complain about the setlist, you see on message boards fans complaining about the setlist LOL--why don't they play more b-sides, too many hits lol, I think we fans should just admit we're never happy and let it go. I'm just suggesting if anyone in Asia/Australia/Europe has the chance to go see them live on the current/next leg of the tour, go. It's a great show, Simon's still a first class front man and better yet, in great voice and may even sound better than ever(after a huge scare last summer where he inexplicably lost nearly 1/3 of his vocal range, nearly a whole octave, and they had to cancel the British and European tour that was planned for the summer), lots of audience participation sing-a-long potential(there is a reason they play a lot of "the hits" it's because Planet Earth, Notorious, Rio, The Reflex, Wild Boys, Ordinary World, etc gets the whole darn audience singing along.) PS: Did you ever hear about how they met Paul McCartney in the studio when they were recording the Rio album and he was recording, I guess, Pipes of Peace(?)--it was George Martin's Air Studios--apparently Heather McCartney met them first(and asked them not to mention how they knew her, as she'd apparently met them whilst hanging with punk rockers her mom and dad didn't exactly love her hanging around with)--- and one day she was like "Would you like to meet my dad" so Paul came in and said he was sure that one song(Rio) he'd heard them playing had HIT written all over it.

21st Century Paul:

SusyLuvsPaul:

I've noticed that handsome men usually have pleasing melodious sounding speaking voices, and Paul IS/was the most handsome Fab. In my opinion

I didn't watch that much in men, but sometimes I say/think "the good-looking singer's voice". Cause the most beautiful voices use to be of singer considered as good-looking, pretty subjetive of course, but it seems like there's something about it. when thinking about beautiful rock and roll voices, it's Elvis, Paul McCartney, George Michael, etc. Elvis had that voice when speaking too.

That's funny because I remember when I was a kid, quite frequently being disappointed upon seeing the face that went along with a voice I'd loved on the radio. Most of the time the looks didn't match the voice. The guy would be ugly as sin, meanwhile I had thought the voice would belong to a cute guy. Still happens to me once in a while, it's just now I actually expect it. LOL