Nigel John Taylor

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John Taylor (2008)

Nigel John Taylor (born June 20, 1960 in Solihull , Warwickshire , England ) is a British musician and since 1978 - with a break from 1997 to 2001 - the bassist of the British band Duran Duran . He is known as John Taylor.

Career

John Taylor grew up in Hollywood, a suburb of Birmingham. His mother Eugene was a devout Anglo-Catholic and raised her son very religiously. In his childhood and youth he was addressed by his first name. In addition to toy soldiers and toy guns, he was mainly interested in music and art from an early age. His favorite band and, according to his own statements, the greatest musical influence to this day was Roxy Music .

After the end of his first marriage, Taylor took on a cover version of the Roxy Music track "Just Another High". The song is about a man wondering why his marriage has just broken up. His parents financed him piano and guitar lessons. His first two bands - with guys from the neighborhood and from school - were short-term projects. They were called "Dada" and "Shock Treatment".

Influenced by the bass parts in the songs of Roxy Music, David Bowie and - during this time especially - Chic , John Taylor decided in 1977 to switch from guitar to bass. He himself says about it: " I got out all my Roxy Music records and started listening to the bass [...] and the way we gelled as a rhythm section I decided to switch to bass for good."

Also in 1977 Taylor met 14-year-old Nicholas Bates, who lived in the neighboring town of Moseley. They liked each other right away and decided to form a band together; this time it shouldn't be a "clink" like with the other projects. Taylor and Bates wanted and planned more. It was by no means intended to be a punk band, although Taylor and Bates both considered themselves big fans of the Sex Pistols at the time.

Both changed their names. Nigel Taylor called himself John Taylor from now on, while Nicholas Bates took on the stage name Nick Rhodes . Although he did not achieve a single A-level (which roughly corresponds to the German Abitur ) when he graduated from high school in the main subjects , Taylor nevertheless began studying art at the University of Birmingham in 1978 . There he meets Stephen Duffy . Taylor, Rhodes and Duffy were the founding members of Duran Duran.

At the beginning of 1979 Taylor, Duffy and Rhodes had a nightclub in the center of Birmingham called "Rum Runner", which Nick Rhodes, as he was still a minor, was only allowed to enter with Duffy or Taylor. The "Rum Runner" was a trendy shop at that time, in which the band UB40 also made their first appearances and for which the designer Martin Degville (who later founded the band Sigue Sigue Sputnik ) designed the wall decorations.

Musical career

The bass part of Do They Know It's Christmas? from Bob Geldof's Band Aid project (1984) was played by John Taylor and not by Sting , as is falsely claimed. (Evidence: The DTKIC promo video and Is That It? Biography by Bob Geldof.)

While the lyrics of Duran Duran are mainly by Simon Le Bon and the compositions are done by Nick Rhodes, John Taylor has always been the main person in charge of developing the musical arrangements.

In 1985 John Taylor wrote the theme song I do what I do for the film 9½ weeks (with Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke in the lead roles), which he also sang and released as a solo single.

Taylor stayed with Duran Duran until 1997. He left the band to pursue an acting career and a solo career. He announced that he was leaving Duran Duran on stage immediately after a concert.

During his career, John Taylor was a member of three other bands: The Power Station , Neurotic Outsiders and The Terrorists . In 2001 he returned to Duran Duran when the five original members reunited.

Private life

John Taylor was considered the "Sexiest Male Popstar Alive" during Duran Duran's most successful period and was mostly voted number one in the readers' polls of teen magazines around the world from 1982 to 1986 in the category of "cutest pop star, male". It was during Duran Duran's concerts that the girls fainted in rows at the sight of him. John Taylor was dating a few supermodels in the middle of the decade. They included the Danish model Renée Simonsen and Bond girl Janine Andrews . In 1988 he had a brief relationship with Grace Jones .

In December 1991, the 31-year-old Taylor married the then 19-year-old Amanda de Cadenet , with whom he had daughter Atlanta Noo four months later. The family moved from England to Los Angeles . In mid-1995, Taylor and de Cadenet separated. While he stayed in the US, she went back to London with Atlanta . The divorce officially took place at the beginning of 1997. Taylor and de Cadenet later admitted using drugs during the marriage, neglecting their young daughter.

Back in the mid-1980s, at the height of her success, Taylor had problems with cocaine and alcohol. He had to go through two withdrawal courses (1989 and 1994). According to his own statements, however, he has stayed clean since the end of 1994.

During the worst phase of his alcohol addiction , he was drowned in a police stop in London in the summer of 1994, spent a night in the sobering cell after quarreling with one of the officers during the alcohol test and had to surrender his driver's license for a year. Shortly before, Taylor had drunk off the road in his car and driven down an embankment while Simon Le Bon was sitting next to him in the passenger seat near London. Both men were unharmed.

In 1999, in Las Vegas, John Taylor married the designer Gela Nash , who was seven years his senior and co-founder of the Juicy Couture clothing line .

In 2004 Taylor bought the South Wraxall Manor country house, one of the UK's oldest still habitable country houses. It is in the county of Wiltshire , near the town of Bradford on Avon.

Taylor's autobiography In The Pleasure Groove was published in September 2012 . Love Death And Duran Duran .

Discography

Studio albums

  • Feelings Are Good and Other Lies (1997)
  • Autodidact (EP) (1997)
  • Resumé (with Jonathan Elias) (1999)
  • Meltdown (1999)
  • The Japan Album (1999)
  • The Japan EP (EP) (2000)
  • Live Cuts (Live) (2000)
  • Terrorists: Live At The Roxy (Live) (2001)
  • Techno For Two (2001)
  • Retreat Into Art (2001)
  • MetaFour (2002)

Singles

year Title
album 		Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements
(Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes) 		Remarks
DE DE AT AT CH CH UK UK US US
1986 I Do What I Do (Theme for 9½ Weeks)
single track 		DE58 (5 weeks)
DE 		- - UK42 (4 weeks)
UK 		US23 (12 weeks)
US
First published: February 1986

literature

  • John Taylor: Dangerously Good Grooves - Love, Death & Duran Duran . Hannibal Verlag, Höfen 2013, ISBN 978-3-85445-408-3 (Original edition: In The Pleasure Groove: Love, Death And Duran Duran ).

swell

  1. ↑ John Carver (ed.): Duran Duran. London 1984, p. 25, ISBN 1-85099-001-8 .
  2. ↑ Dave Fudger (Ed.): Duran Duran In Their Own Words. London 1983, ISBN 0-7119-0374-3 .
  3. ↑ Bob Geldof: Is That It ?. London 1986, ISBN 0-14-009363-X .
  4. ↑ youtube.com
  5. ↑ Smash Hits from December 17, 1986
  6. ↑ Pop Special Magazin issue 12/1985
  7. ^ Time Out of March 24, 1997
  8. ↑ Andy Taylor: Wild Boy. My Life In Duran Duran. New York 2008, ISBN 0-446-50930-2 , p. 156ff.
  9. ↑ John Taylor with Tom Sykes: In The Pleasure Groove. Love Death And Duran Duran . New York City 2012, ISBN 978-0-525-95800-0
  10. ↑ Chart sources: DE UK US

Web links

Wikiquote: Nigel John Taylor  - Quotes
personal data
SURNAME Taylor, Nigel John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Taylor, John
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British musician
DATE OF BIRTH June 20, 1960
PLACE OF BIRTH Solihull , Warwickshire , England