Warren Cuccurullo

Warren Bruce Cuccurullo (born December 8, 1956 in Brooklyn) is a rock and pop guitarist who has worked with Frank Zappa, Duran Duran, and Missing Persons. Cuccurullo grew up in the Canarsie neighborhood of New York City. He began playing drums and guitar as a young child.

The Duran Duran Years

Missing Persons shared their label Capitol Records with British band Duran Duran. As Missing Persons fell apart, Bozzio and O'Hearn were approached by Duran guitarist Andy Taylor in Los Angeles for work on a solo album. In this way, Cuccurullo learned that Taylor didn't intend to rejoin Duran in England to work on their next album, even before the rest of Duran Duran knew. Cuccurullo sent a tape and a request for an audition, but was turned down, with some puzzlement.

Related Topics:
Duran Duran - Andy Taylor - Los Angeles - England

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As it became clear that neither enticements nor lawsuits would get Taylor back in the studio, Duran Duran did hire Cuccurullo as a session guitarist to complete the album Notorious. He went on to tour with the band, and returned to contribute his increasingly experimental guitar work to the album Big Thing. At the end of the grueling ten-month Big Thing world tour, Cuccurullo was made an official member of the band, and moved to London. Shifting record label politics and the unsuccessful album Liberty almost derailed the band, but after Cuccurullo offered them the use of his home studio ("Privacy") in Battersea, Duran Duran was able to shift to a more comfortable and controlled music-making style.

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Cuccurullo's songwriting, guitar skills and driving personality contributed to the band's return to fame with 1993's Wedding Album. He was the primary composer of the hit singles "Ordinary World" and "Come Undone", although the lyrics were written by Simon Le Bon. He created new arrangements for many of the band's old hits for the acoustic-flavored tour that followed, as well as arranging full acoustic pieces for the piano and six-piece string section that performed with them on the MTV Unplugged show. After Frank Zappa's untimely death in December of 1993, Cuccurullo performed the instrumental guitar piece "Watermelon in Easter Hay" (from the Joe's Garage album) in his honor at several Duran Duran shows.

Related Topics:
1993 - Simon Le Bon - MTV Unplugged

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Tentative plans for a Missing Persons reunion in 1994 were shelved over remaining tensions between former band members.

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Cuccurullo continued to hold Duran Duran together during the band's lean times in the 1990s. The covers album Thank You (1995) was an attempt to keep the peace among band members who had increasing trouble writing music together. Medazzaland (1997) and Pop Trash (2000)—written after the departure of bassist John Taylor and Duran Duran's separation from Capitol Records—featured more of Cuccurullo's songwriting, as well as some reworked TV Mania material, but failed to dent the charts.

Related Topics:
1990s - 1995 - 1997 - 2000 - John Taylor - TV Mania

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