Simon LeBon
Simon John Charles Le Bon was born October 27, 1958 is the
lead singer and lyricist of Duran Duran. He was born in Bushey,
Le Bon was a member of the local church choir from a young
age, but was also trained as an actor. He appeared in a few television
commercials and also in several theatre productions. He worked on a
kibbutz --a farm-- in the Negev desert in |
Duran Duran had been founded with singer/songwriter Stephen
Duffy in 1978, but Duffy left a year later, convinced they weren't going any
where. The band had been through a long succession of lineup changes since, but
had recently settled on a guitarist and drummer and built a powerful pop sound
flavored with disco, funk and electronics but built on a solid rock rhythm
section. All they needed was a charismatic singer with a distinctive voice.
Le Bon's ex-girlfriend Fiona Kemp (a barmaid at the Rum
Runner club where Duran Duran was rehearsing) introduced him to the band in May
of 1980, recommending him as a potential vocalist. As band legend has it, he
turned up for the audition wearing pink leopard-print trousers, carrying a book
of poetry he had written. He tried out some of the songs the band had already
composed together, then spent some time fitting one of his poems ("Sound of
Thunder") to one of the band's instrumentals, and found they had a good
match. Simon agreed to "try them out for the summer"; within six weeks
the band was playing steadily around
The band's first album, Duran Duran, was released in 1981,
and they quickly shot to fame as part of the New Romantic movement. Three more
albums followed in quick succession: |
That year Le Bon also wooed the young fashion model Yasmin
Parvaneh, after seeing her face in a magazine and calling the modelling agency
until he tracked her down. They married on December 27, 1985 and Yasmin Le Bon
has gone on to a supermodel career of unusual longevity, spanning twenty years
despite the births of their three daughters: Amber (born 1989), Saffron (1991)
and Tallulah (1994). |
While Duran Duran was on hiatus in 1985, Le Bon drew media
attention when his maxi-yacht Drum lost its keel and capsized during the Fastnet
race, trapping him and other crew members inside the hull for fourty minutes. He
went on to participate in the Whitbread Round the World Race, coming in third
overall.
Before Duran Duran reunited, Le Bon formed the band |
Le Bon, Rhodes and John Taylor reunited to record and
perform as Duran Duran, releasing Notorious (1987), Big Thing (1989),
Duran Duran had a resurgence in popularity in 1993 with The
Wedding Album. Several months into the intensive concert tour supporting this
album, Le Bon suffered from strained vocal cords, and the tour was postponed for
six weeks while he recovered.
In 1995, Duran Duran released the covers album Thank You,
and Le Bon had the chance to cover some of his favorite artists (Jim Morrison,
Lou Reed, Elvis Costello). That year Le Bon also performed the band's 1993 hit
"Ordinary World" with opera tenor Luciano Pavarotti during a
"Children of Bosnia" benefit concert for War Child. He described the
event to Jam! Showbiz thus: "If you're talking about name dropping, he's
one of the biggest names you could drop, Pav-The-Man."
After bassist John Taylor left in 1997, Le Bon and
keyboardist Nick Rhodes were left as the only two members who had been with the
band throughout its career. The two albums without any Taylors, Medazzaland
(1997) and Pop Trash (2000) were not commercial successes.
In 2001, the original five members reunited to begin
working on new material, and have performed around the world. The new album
Astronaut, out on Epic Records, was released worldwide on 11 October 2004. The
album was preceded by the single "(Reach Up For The) |
While Le Bon has been in Duran Duran for the band's entire
history, he has also dabbled in solo outings. In 1985, for the Whitbread Round
the World Race, he contributed a song entitled "Grey Lady Of The Sea"
and narrated a video of that year's race called Drum (1987). Grey Lady Of The
Sea was released as a single in
In 1989, for Jonathan Elias' Requiem For The Americas
project, he contributed "Follow In My Footsteps", with Bangle Susannah
Hoffs on background vocals. The track was released on 7" single in
In 1998, along with friend Nick Wood and wife Yasmin, he
set up SYN Entertainment in
In 2000, SYN Entertainment founded SYN Records which has
released a number of compilations, some of which have included Le Bon
contributions. Another solo track, "Dreamboy", was featured on the SYN-released
soundtrack to the Mario Van Peebles movie Love Kills.
In 2000 as well, SYN co-executive produced the Duran Duran
album Pop Trash along with Nick Rhodes and Warren Cuccurullo's side-venture TV
Mania.
* extracted from Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia