Well, I've been listening to Billy's albums quite a lot in the last year and have to say that for me the best one is Still Movement. It contains my favourite Billy track (Waving Hands in Clouds) and lots of general loveliness. I haven't heard Refine yet though.

And what's your favourite Nick Rhodes solo album?

Fav Nick Rhodes album - get lost u - lol lets NOT go there!!!

I LOVE the new album Refine - I think you will too - but strangely I've been listening a lot to Still Movement myself recently - more so than before - and my fave tracks are Waving Hands in Clouds, Afterglow and Deflect Downward. I do a lot of walking meditation and found this album helpful recently! I go through stages - before REfine came out i was listening a lot to APOTS, love the title track - esp the piano work - and if people are going through a tough time i always dedicate 'Listening to Strength' to them - but yeah - I have developed a recent soft spot for Still Movement. J.

With a clear risk of annoying BC-fundamentalists again - NR have in fact released something of a soloalbum a few years ago, "Dark Circles" as The Devils with the singer Stephen Duffy. An album which actually got several positive reviews as an emotional and reflective work. But never mind that...

I only know about BC in the context of Ultravox and Visage but are honestly interested in finding out more about his solowork. I´ve been recommended these two compilations "Pieces of the puzzle" and "60 minutes with.." and are trying to find out if there are any other good starting points. Anything other to recommend?

Some of Duran did have a busman's holiday type extra curricular outing, so some of the criticisms levelled at them are a tad unfair; wasn't it called Arcadia? I think I heard some and quite enjoyed it.

As before : see www.billycurrie.com
( where you can get clips of most of the albums )

I know about this website and have already checked it out, but it would be interesting to get views from fans of BC´s solowork as well.

With a clear risk of annoying BC-fundamentalists again -


Fear not - I have a gardening tool at the ready this time!!! youe been warned lol

I dont really like compilations - as i feel teh work is so diverse I think its best if you listen to each album. Each one has a unique personality. Given teh new one has just come out I think this is an excellent/essential starting point.
Refine

I have much of Billy's work in what I call my 'lava lamp and incense sticks' collection (along with Floyd and Hawkwind) - theres some real chilled trippy tracks - one of my faves being 'why to you hang on me' - off hte 'Push' album.

Still Movement is very 'tranquil& beautiful' as is APOTS. Some of the piano work is soooo lovely - very deep moving stuff (well i think so!).

'Transportation' is my 'champagne and cocktails' album - its quite eccentric - very experimental with style and sounds and techniques. 'Keys and Fiddle' has some very vintage sounding synth heavy tracks.

F*&^%g amazing musician/work that I feel has so sadly been overlooked in general over the years.

Anyway - check out 'Refine' first then maybe Push and take it from there. All can be downloaded now from Amazon etc (Refine download only). I do hope you enjoy!

A lot of the albums used to be available from bc's site for 1.99 uk, download

Wouldn´t want to suggest we´d discuss above mentioned Arcadia then?

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"> Originally posted by Desolate Angel:


Wouldn´t want to suggest we´d discuss above mentioned Arcadia then?

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

I'd forgotten about Arcadia. I remember quite liking their album. I've also just discovered, from Wikipedia, that The Power Station released a second album in 1997! Although, sadly for Duranies, John Taylor wasn't involved.

No, but he recorded several soloalbums at the time that might be worth checking out. "Feelings are good (and other lies)", a collaboration with Steve Jones of Sex Pistols, and one album that was only released in Japan, as well as forming group Terroristen and working as a film actor. Full information about his solocareer can be found on Wikipedia.

Some Arcadia songs are rather forgettable but there are several prominent guests on that album - Dave Gilmour, Herbie Hancock, Andy Mackay, Sting. I quite like The Promise which have a beautifully arranged instrumental part and backingvocals by Sting that works really well.

True, but Andy Taylor was. The album was called 'Living in Fear' - producer Bernard Edwards (of 'Chic' fame) played bass on the album in John Taylors's absence, although he himself sadly died of pneumonia before the album was released. On the subsequent promotional tour, Guy Pratt (Pink Floyd) and then Manny Yanes stood in on bass guitar duties. I saw them play a warm up gig at the Hannover Grand in London in, I think, 1996 - the magic that inspired the original project had obviously been lost by that point, and after the album came out to relatively mixed reviews and success, the group disbanded.

One of the most interesting facts about John Taylor is that, I believe, he was asked to leave the LA based band 'Neurotic Outsiders' in 1996/97 for, effectively, 'conduct unbefitting'. A fact all the more fascinating given that the band consisted of former pop/teen idol Taylor, Steve Jones (of The Sex Pistols) and Duff Mckagen and Matt Sorum (from Guns N' Roses). The latter three are hardly a bunch of shrinking violets are they? And if they felt Taylor was behaving badly given their past and reputations, it must have been bad.



Regards,


Paul

Arcadia was a rather superb little side project and So Red The Rose a rather fine little album that incidently enough is getting re-released next year as a three disc effort that includes just about all the b-sides and remixes plus a DVD of the promo video for the single plus some making of said video featurettes...

Thank you, Simon. :p

From memory, I believe it was because the others in the band were trying to stay clean and sober and JT was still going through his girls, drugs and booze phase...

Is there another section for 'Duranies'?

Did you know that Stephan"Tin Tin"Duffy was the original singer in Duran Duran?

Bizarrely some bloke called John Foxx was apparently the original singer in Ultravox - both bands improved with the second bloke on the mic...

I sure do and suppose that Dark Circles was a way of getting back together after some twenty years and exploring their musical roots and what might have been if Duffy hadn´t been sacked from the group, apparently because he was too much into Art school experimentalism. Ironically his mid-80´s solo hits like Icing On The Cake were rather conventional pop records.

Ooh, controversial.

Why, oh, why did I mention Nick Rhodes?

Ah! Stephen Duffy, a truly unsung hero. So many superb tunes. Dark Circles was a re-recording of early Duran songs he found on a tape & the album was recorded on all original 70s equipment, so if you want to know how good Duran Duran could have been, that's the place to go...

I'm really getting into Accidental Poetry of the Structure right now.

Well I've had to submit my top ten for 2009 for publication and of course at no 1 it has to be Refine!!