From the band’s very beginning in the late Seventies, and right through to the present day, new wave legends Duran Duran have always struck a balance between live and mechanical rhythm.
That’s one reason keyboardist Nick Rhodes volunteered to write the foreword to Dancing to the Drum Machine, my new history of electronic percussion: he’s always been a drum machine user—and, more than that, a drum machine fan.
Thinking back, Rhodes points out that drafting drummer Roger Taylor into the group didn't stop his rhythm box experiments.
“The first album has a bunch of drum machines on it. ‘Waiting for the Night Boat’ has a drum machine on it, and live drums,” Rhodes recalls. “And there was a song which wasn’t included on the American album, called ‘To the Shore,’ that has a rhythm box, and then I think drums come in later on that. So we've always been open to using rhythm boxes alongside live percussion.”
Rhodes offered these rhythm box reflections during the early days of the global pandemic in 2020. Holed up at home in England, and riding out a hiatus in sessions for the band’s latest album, Future Past, he admitted he was glad to be talking about drum machines instead of current events. “It’s just every time I turn on the television,” he said, “I’m afraid of what the news might be.”
In the second installment of this two-part conversation, the new Rock and Roll Hall of Fame talks about how drum programming has changed throughout Duran Duran’s career, how he equates rhythm boxes to Stravinsky’s modernist masterpiece “The Rite of Spring,” and whether there’s still room for drum machines in today’s software-dominated music world. (Spoiler: there is.)
You’ve talked a lot about your love of the Roland TR-808, and the role it played in classic Duran Duran tracks like “Hungry Like the Wolf” and “The Chauffeur.” But the LinnDrum, I guess, also played an important role in the next phase of the band's history, from Seven and the Ragged Tiger to Notorious.
Well, we did use the LinnDrum a fair bit. It's on some of the other stuff, on Notorious I think. What we tended to do was to actually use it with live drums, rather than feature it on its own. My favorite use of Linn drums is on the Prince records. If you listen to anything off Purple Rain, that's all Linn—“Let’s Go Crazy.” Obviously, it's on “When Doves Cry.” But I think it was quite inventive because it was real punky dance music, and obviously it had all that rawness and live instrumentation on top of it. And I really do think he benefited from the Linn as much as anyone.
But it's on a load of other things. It’s on the Hall and Oates one—"Out of Touch,” is it? Yeah, it's on that, which I think was good use.
You can pick out where people have really featured rhythm units in songs beautifully, like Marvin Gaye—“Sexual Healing” comes to mind, too. It's such a prominent part of that song.
“I can recognize an 808 snare drum, or kick drum, or hit-hat from ten thousand paces, when it’s playing on a radio in the wind—it’s so distinctive.” —Nick Rhodes
By the time Big Thing came out in 1988, though, drum machines had started to be folded into sampling, digital workstations — the forerunners of computer recording. Were there actual drum machines on that album, do you recall, or were they part of a more holistic technological approach?
That was probably when the MPC60 came out. We were playing around with that all the time. Putting different sounds on things was a real luxury—to actually say, “Right, well, that's great, but can we use that snare and can we use that bass drum? And, hmmm, I don't like that hi-hat—let’s swap that out for something a bit heavier.”
That was fun, being able to mix up kicks and say, “Well, let's have a really heavy open hi-hat, but then let's mix it in with this tiny thing that plays six beats all the way through the song.” It was a game; it was a big move.
I mean, we tended to use rhythm boxes more as a texture and as a synth part, rather than the whole rhythm of the track. But then, occasionally, we have found that it was useful to use rhythm boxes to our advantage as the main part of the track. We reached that point, particularly on the Big Thing album, with songs like “All She Wants,” “I Don't Want Your Love”—which does have the live drums coming in on the choruses, if I remember right, but the verses and the chorus also have electronic drums.
I felt for a long time that dance music was moving in that direction, and the writing was on the wall. It wasn't any particular prophecy; you could see it. And so I wanted to have that element be part of the band, but I don't think any of us were prepared to let go of our roots, that came also from disco and glam rock and punk rock. And we didn't want everything to become entirely electronic—Kraftwerk had already done that better than anyone else was likely to do it.
You know, we go through different phases, and we do pull in opposite directions, which is why I guess the band still works, and why we like to continue to make modern records. I've often felt that bands reach a point where they find their sound, usually quite early on, and they stick with it, particularly if it’s become a successful sound. It’s a brand; it’s what people want. And a lot of artists have done exceptionally well by following that route.
For me, that's my ultimate nightmare. I can't think of anything that I would like less than to make the same sort of record with the same tools and the same objective every time. So our objective has always been to smash up whatever came before and make something new. Every time, let's just see where it goes, what we can do. And you know, we're limited by our individual tastes and musical abilities and the instruments we have. But we're not limited to the fact that we have to keep the same sort of sound and lineup.
So, for example, a couple of tours ago, we decided to pay homage to Kraftwerk, and all four of us did an electronic set for about 25 minutes as part of the full show. We all came to the front and had synthesizers—Roger had electronic drum pads, and the other three of us played synths. John played the bass part, I played all the pads and some of the melodies, and Simon had a vocoder and played some melodies too. I like having that flexibility, is what I'm saying—the ability to change the shape of what we are. We’re much more of an amoeba than a circle or square.
In (bassist) John (Taylor)’s autobiography, he mentions that by the end of the Eighties, he felt there were “too many drum machines,” and that the band needed to get back to being a five-piece — which is why he says he lobbied so hard for drummer Sterling Campbell to join.
As part of a larger question, though, I’m curious about whether this was an ongoing point of debate in the band — i.e. “too many machines, too much programming, not live-enough sounds,” etc.? Is that a question that has resurfaced thought the band’s history?
Yeah, I'm afraid I'm on the wrong side of the fence for that one. Because from the beginning, I've used strings and brass, and oboes, and percussion, and anything. What I loved about the idea of synthesizers and rhythm units is that that is your orchestra: you can do what you want with them; that's your tool kit. And really, it's how you build the house with that tool kit.
And having the great universe of sounds right there in front of you, you couldn't wish for a better palate than to have all the electronic things. I love guitars too, and basses, and drums, and live instruments—all of those I happen to like. But to me, [it can be like] a beautiful line drawing, if you do something with an acoustic guitar. And there's nothing wrong with that at all, but if you have the ability to say, “I can have any drum sound I want, and I can program any rhythm I want with these things, and I can use synthesizers—I can make a wall of sound out of white noise and remodulated bells, and then I will put some strings with it as well, and some bright tacky sound,” then certainly you’ve got a very different picture. You’ve got all different kinds of textures going on, and I think that you know there’s a reason music drifted-- contemporary music drifted—much more to synths over the recent couple of decades or more. It’s because you have that extra flexibility: you have such a broad palate; you can do remarkable things.
A great guitarist can make noises that no one else can, can create an energy that nothing else is like. But we were recently working with (Blur guitarist) Graham Coxon on the new Duran album. And he looked at me, and he held up his guitar, and he said, “Well, can you believe that we're still fiddling around with these blocks of wood with these strings of metal stretched over them? It looks like an antique, really, doesn’t it?” And we were laughing about it. Of course, Graham is a master guitarist, and he can do incredible things with that chunk of wood with strings pulled over it. But he was really remarking on how it's not as easy to fit guitars into modern music anymore. Of course, there’s indie music, which is a separate genre, but if you’re trying to make something that maybe belongs on a dance floor…it’s definitely more electronic than it ever was before.
By the end of the Eighties and beginning of the Nineties, I think you could say that drum machines had won their place in music. Most bands were using them to some extent, and as the technology got folded into the larger picture of music production, everyone began taking it for granted. But for a long time, drum machines were a pejorative.
Yeah, I think when things are like that, I’m always on the maverick side. If you think back to when Stravinsky—“The Rite of Spring” in Paris, and the audience didn’t understand it at all, and he got booed off stage. They were literally throwing things at the orchestra, and it was a beautiful refined opera house, and they were so appalled and so shocked by what was going on. Here was an incredible piece of classical music that has gone on to be recognized as one of the great pieces of the time, and is now performed often around the world by orchestras, but at that time people said, “Oh, this isn't music. It’s got nothing to do with music.” Because they’re used to something completely different.
And I think that that probably did start to happen with synthesizers, and less so with rhythm boxes, because people didn't realize how much influence rhythm boxes were going to have earlier on. It was more of a slow process, and I think that it’s just developed in ways that none of could have possible foreseen. If you look at the TR-808, [that’s] to me the most incredible rhythm box story. Because when it first came out, it was sort of, I suppose, angled at sort of rock musicians, or new electronic music. But then the hip hoppers discovered it, and by the time you get to the late Nineties, it’s on virtually every hip hop record you hear. And it’s become that sound—it’s all been developed from the 808.
I can recognize an 808 snare drum, or kick drum, or hit-hat from ten thousand paces, when it’s playing on a radio in the wind—it’s so distinctive. And if it isn’t that sound, it’s a sample of that sound.
Obviously, today you can have any sound you want using software. Is there still a place for the standalone drum machine?
Oh yes, absolutely. I love analog synths and I also love analog drum machines—not so much digital ones. Because there’s something about [analog instruments] where they all sound different. There’s lots of controversy about the Linn and the chip—whatever the name of the chip was that was in the later ones, which made the top end of it much more crunchy and compressed. So you have to get the right LinnDrum. You don’t want the one that was produced at that time; you wanted one that had that chip in it. And it’s those kind of things, those quirky things with analog instruments, that make them more real for me. A Roland Jupiter 8 or a Sequential Circuits Prophet 5, they’re sort of as organic as any guitar or bass or drums. You can do things with them you can’t do with other instruments.
When you get a digital version of either a drum machine or a synthesizer—yes, it can do a lot of things. Yes, it can replicate things. But it cannot behave in the same way as an analog machine. So when you get a sample of a TR-808, every snare drum sounds the same. And you’re putting it precisely on that beat on your grid—whether it’s ProTools, or whatever other system you're using—you put it there, and that's what you're getting on your song. If you use a real 808, there’s going to be differences in the sound. Some beats will be a little lighter than others; some beats might last a little bit longer; sometimes it might crackle a little bit more. It’s a different sort of sound, and that’s what I particularly love about all electronic analog gear, you know—it’s that you can’t replace it.
“(E)very time I look at the color scheme of the 808, I just smile, and think, “I’m gonna have fun today.”—Nick Rhodes
When we made our album All You Need Is Now with Mark Ronson, the first thing Mark wanted to do was get out all the gear, all the analog gear, and all the things we'd already made records with. He just wanted to see and hear what it was. And he said, “No, I want that sound because that sounds so much more modern than the things that are around now.” And he ended up completely replicating my synth selection for himself for his studio. He did ask me—“If you don't mind”—and I said of course not (laughs). But he fell in love with using that type of gear. And that’s not the first time. If you hear every record Mark’s made, he’s a complete fanatic for beautiful vintage sound, as he used on Amy Winehouse, and in many other things he’s done. He was particularly interested in synths and rhythm boxes, and so we used all the original things.
So are there drum machines on the new Duran Duran album? (Future Past, the band’s 15th studio recording, which was released in October 2021)
Yes. In fact, we’ve done a couple tracks with the great maestro Giorgio Moroder. And everything on them is electronic—actually, I think there’s a live bass on it, but everything else is electronic—and so afterwards, Roger politely volunteered, “Giorgio, would you like me to try any parts with live drums to play along with the things on the tracks?” and Giorgio turned around and said, “Well, I don’t really like live instruments.” With a wry smile, of course, and we all laughed.
But it sounds great, and so, no, there are no live drums on those two tracks. Of course, there are a lot on the rest of the alum. But there’s rhythm boxes on there [as well]. I used some old things. I like to use things—if I find things that I’ve never ever seen before, that are $50 or something, and it looks like the cheapest, nastiest thing you’ve ever seen, but it’s old, I end up buying it and think, “I'll end up getting something out of it.” So I’ve got a load of rhythm boxes I couldn’t even tell you the name of. They’re fun to play with because of their personality. That’s really what were talking about. Rhythm boxes all have a personality, you know.
The Bentley Rhythm Ace—which I’ve never actually owned, though I’ve used one before—it’s got a great personality of its own. And every time I look at the color scheme of the 808, I just smile, and think, “I’m gonna have fun today.” They’re unique things, and for people that are used to just working within the box of the computer, they don’t probably even realize what the differences are.
It’s the same thing with a lot of the digital stuff that’s out there now. I used to take a lot of 35mm photos and I was going through a box the other day [of photos] that were just around the period in the late Nineties when we were all starting to try out digital. And so I looked at them, and I took in the colors and the grain, and then I looked at some fairly recent images. Digital photography has come a long way; we're getting closer to analog in some ways. You can filter things and do things, but when you take a digital picture, you can have whatever you like, but it’s still not the same as when you took something with a relatively simple 35mm camera. The results are different. There’s a different edge to them. They have more depth, and I think that’s very much true of the sound of analog instruments—very much drum machines.
You know, you do these A-B samples of Linns and 808s and 909s, and then I use the real things, and there’s never any competition. They’re always better to me. If you want something that's just small and precise, you can use the sample. [But] if you want something that feels richer and deeper, you always use the machine.
Dancing to the Drum Machine: How Electronic Percussion Conquered the World is available now from Bloomsbury, on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, or at many other retailers.
Visit my website, danleroy.com, for information about upcoming events, and follow me on twitter (@danleroy) or Instagram (@danleroysbonusbeats). And consider subscribing to this Substack newsletter for access to exclusive content—including an exclusive chapter about how a drum machine broke up postpunk icons Gang of Four!