About this song
- "Hungry Like the Wolf" is a song by the British New Wave band Duran Duran. Written by the band members, the song was produced by Colin Thurston for the group's second studio album Rio (1982). The song was released in May 1982 as the album's fifth single in the United Kingdom. It reached the top five of the UK Singles Chart, and received a silver certification by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). "Hungry Like the Wolf"'s Russell Mulcahy-directed music video was filmed in the exotic jungles of Sri Lanka, and evoked the atmosphere of the film Raiders of the Lost Ark. Although the band initially failed to break into the U.S. market, MTV placed the "Hungry Like the Wolf" video into heavy rotation. Subsequently, the group gained much exposure; "Hungry Like the Wolf" peaked at the third spot of the Billboard Hot 100 in March 1983, and Duran Duran became an international sensation. The video won the first Grammy Award for Best Short Form Music Video in 1984. "Hungry Like the Wolf" was written and recorded on a Saturday in the spring of 1982 at the basement studios of EMI's London headquarters. Rhodes started the song's demo in the morning with a sequencer; the song was built throughout the day as each band member arrived, and by the evening it was essentially complete. "That track came from fiddling with the new technology that was starting to come in", guitarist Andy Taylor said in an interview with Blender magazine. This refers to the rhythmic backing track they came up with by joining a Roland 808 drum machine with a sequencer and a Roland Jupiter 8 keyboard. Rhodes came up with an idea for the backing track in the car while he was going to the studio. He started playing with the Roland Jupiter 8 keyboard, while singer Simon Le Bon was working with the lyrics. The lyrics were inspired by Little Red Riding Hood, and the repeating of the word "do" at the end of each verse, is an inspiration from Gordon Lightfoot's song "If You Could Read My Mind". Andy Taylor worked out a Marc Bolan-ish guitar part, a very Marshall-sounding Les Paul guitar lick that was added to the track. Then the bass and drums were added, and the whole track was finished that day, including Le Bon's vocal melody and lyrics. The laugh at the beginning of the song and the screams during the song's fade-out were performed and recorded live by Rhode’s girlfriend at the time. They group re-recorded the song for the Rio album a few months later at London's AIR Studios with producer Colin Thurston, who also recorded the hits "Too Shy" for Kajagoogoo, and "I Want Candy" for Bow Wow Wow. Andy Taylor remembers: "He was a great organizer and arranger, we gave him far more ideas and music than the track actually needed, and he was important in the process of whittling them down to the essential elements." Thurston and the band decided to keep the demo's original electronic backing track and just re-record the other instruments and vocals. "Hungry Like the Wolf" received generally positive reviews from contemporary pop music critics. Rob Mitchum of Pitchfork Media in a 2003 review of the "Singles Box Set 1981-1985", said that "singles don't come much stronger than 'Hungry Like the Wolf'," praising its "bubbly keys around a slashing guitar riff," adding that the song "show off how Duran Duran was a band, not just a synthesizer." Jon Pareles from The New York Times, said the song "put an oblique, sometimes apocalyptic spin on pop romance in the verses but kept the choruses clear and catchy, never disguising their pop intentions," adding that the "posing was always a little preposterous, but no less enjoyable for that." Ned Raggett from Allmusic said the song "blended a tight, guitar-heavy groove with electronic production and a series of instant hooks," adding that it was one of Rio's "biggest smashes" that "open[ed] the door in America for the New Romantic/synth rock crossover." In 1982, music video director Russell Mulcahy, who had directed the band's first video "Planet Earth," was brought back to make the music video for "Hungry Like the Wolf" and two other songs for the band's 1983 video album. The band had a vision of jungles and exotic women, and Mulcahy suggested Sri Lanka, a country he had just visited. EMI invested $200,000 to send the group to Sri Lanka; the band made a stopover there in April, in route to a scheduled Australian tour. Keyboardist Nick Rhodes remained behind to finish the mixing of the Rio album while the rest of the band began filming the video; Rhodes flew straight to Sri Lanka after handing over the final masters to EMI. As it was described in the pop culture book, The 1980s, the video was lush and cinematic, with shots of jungles, rivers, elephants, cafes and marketplaces evoking the atmosphere of the film Raiders of the Lost Ark. In the video, singer Simon Le Bon's head rises in slow motion out of the river as rain pours down. He then chases a beautiful tiger-like Indian woman played by Bermudian model Sheila Ming, from — lastfm
- "Hungry Like the Wolf" is a song by the English pop rock band Duran Duran. Written by the band members, the song was produced by Colin Thurston for the group's second studio album, Rio (1982). The song was released on 4 May 1982 as the band's fifth single in the United Kingdom, and 7 June 1982 in the United States. — wikipedia
