Liner Notes · No. 022
"Hungry Like the Wolf" by Duran Duran: the B-side
Quick hall pass: the song America shrugged at in 1982 got sung by a cartoon wolf, played on a plastic guitar and brought back by Sabrina Carpenter in front of 65,000 people. Here's the B-side.
📰 FAST FACTS
- That 1982 MTV New Year's Eve show came out in August 2024 on the 3CD Transmission Impossible (Broadcast Recordings). Forty-two years in the vault. Worth the wait. (Season of Mist)
- As the Lights Go Down got a remastered Record Store Day vinyl release in April 2019. The VHS your cousin wore out has finally been replaced. (Wikipedia)
- The O2 show follows Halloween shows in Las Vegas (2022), Madison Square Garden (2024) and Manchester (2025). At this point the band owns Halloween. (Classic Pop)
- Danse Macabre, their latest studio album, reached #4 in the UK in 2023. (Classic Pop)
On this record
TRACK 1 · The cameo
A cartoon wolf, a plastic guitar and Sabrina Carpenter
A cartoon wolf sang it in Shrek 2, Rock Band 2 taught it on plastic drums, and Sabrina Carpenter brought the band out at Hyde Park.
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The talent show: November 5, 2004. The Shrek 2 DVD and VHS shipped with an all-new ending, "Far Far Away Idol," an American Idol spoof with Simon Cowell sitting in judgment. One of the contestants takes on a Duran Duran song, backed by the Three Little Pigs. The pigs get scared and run off mid-song. Fair. Most backup singers in 1982 would have done the same if they'd seen those haircuts up close.
The game: September 14, 2008. Rock Band 2 put the song on the track list, and not the studio take: it used the live recording from the band's 1984 concert film Arena. So a whole generation learned it on a plastic drum kit, screaming along to a crowd that had been dead-serious about eyeliner 24 years earlier.
The encore: July 6, 2025, BST Hyde Park in London, the second of Sabrina Carpenter's two sold-out headline shows. She brought out Simon Le Bon and John Taylor to play it for about 65,000 people. Le Bon took lead vocals; Carpenter sang harmonies and the second verse. Somewhere, a 1983 teenager who taped this off MTV just felt very old and very validated.
Back to that Shrek DVD. Who was holding the mic? Your call ↓
In the Shrek 2 DVD extra "Far Far Away Idol," who sings "Hungry Like the Wolf"?
If you watched the pop-ups, this one's a freebie.
That's Side A. Flip the tape.
Side B is where it gets weird:
- MTV's 1982 New Year's Eve ball, two sold-out Madison Square Garden nights in 1984, and the Rock Hall in 2022.
- Covers from Shamir and Muse, plus a synthpop ballad, all taking their turn.
- Where Duran Duran and Andy Taylor are in 2026.
Free, every Tuesday. One song, the story you never heard, and a 10-minute hall pass from the doomscroll. Already subscribed? Enter your email to unlock.
▶ SIDE B
TRACK 2 · The live one
New Year's Eve 1982 to the Rock Hall
MTV's 1982 New Year's Eve ball, two sold-out Garden nights, a concert film and a 2022 Rock Hall set played for real.
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The ball drop: December 31, 1982. Duran Duran headlined MTV's second New Year's Eve Rock 'N' Roll Ball, live from the Palladium in New York, simulcast on the King Biscuit Flower Hour. A British band ringing in 1983 on a cable channel most of America still couldn't get. Your parents watched Dick Clark. You begged to stay at your friend's house with cable.
The Garden: March 19 and 21, 1984. Two sold-out nights at Madison Square Garden on the Sing Blue Silver tour, "Hungry Like the Wolf" in the set, and a 15-minute "Girls on Film" encore. Fifteen minutes. That's not an encore. That's a second shift.
The movie: The 1984 Oakland arena shows were filmed for Arena (An Absurd Notion), out on VHS in March 1985, and cut into a one-hour concert video, As the Lights Go Down, which aired on Cinemax, MTV and ITV (December 30, 1984). Here's the song from that show:
The Hall: November 5, 2022, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in Los Angeles. The band played "Girls on Film," "Hungry Like the Wolf" and "Ordinary World." They stopped "Girls on Film" partway and restarted it, to prove they weren't lip-syncing. Forty years in, still playing it for real.
Original guitarist Andy Taylor couldn't travel to the ceremony. Simon Le Bon read a letter from him on stage.
TRACK 3 · Cover watch
Shamir, Muse and a slow-motion ballad
A cartoon wolf, a quiet Shamir cover, Muse at full volume and a rainy-window synth ballad. Vote below.
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- 2004 · The Big Bad Wolf. The Shrek 2 version from Side A. A cartoon wolf singing a song about a hungry wolf. Method acting.
- 2016 · Shamir. A slow, solo acoustic cover, released in January 2016 to mark his opening slot on Duran Duran's tour. Opening act etiquette: compliment the headliner by playing their hit, quietly.
- 2019 · Muse. The pop-ups caught their French TV debut on Taratata. The studio version was recorded at AIR Studios in London for Spotify Singles and released January 9, 2019. AIR is where Duran Duran re-cut the original, so Muse brought it home and turned everything up. Subtle has never been a Muse setting.
- 2020 · The Rain Within. Andy Deane's synthpop project slowed it into a ballad in October 2020. A song about chasing someone through a jungle, reworked for staring out a rainy window. Very 2020.
▶ WATCH THE CONTENDERS
Battle of the versions: which "Hungry Like the Wolf" wins?
Cast your vote. Results in the next issue. Choose carefully: we're judging you.
TRACK 4 · Where are they now
Where Duran Duran is now
A new single with Nile Rodgers and a fall arena tour. Andy Taylor, living with stage 4 prostate cancer, made a solo album and said he's asymptomatic.
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The new single: On April 23, 2026, Duran Duran released "Free to Love," made with Nile Rodgers, followed by a set of remixes. Their latest studio album is still Danse Macabre (2023), and no new album has been announced. On July 5, 2026, the band headlined BST Hyde Park in London, with Rodgers joining for "Notorious" and "Free to Love," per setlist.fm. One year after being Sabrina Carpenter's surprise guests, they were the ones handing out the surprises.
The tour: This fall's UK and European arena tour opened in Oslo on October 2, with the UK leg starting at Glasgow's OVO Hydro on October 15. Booked after that: a "Danse Macabre Halloween Party" at London's O2 on October 31, their first Halloween show in London, and Lisbon on November 3.
Andy Taylor: In November 2022, original guitarist Andy Taylor shared that he has stage 4 metastatic prostate cancer, diagnosed about four years earlier. In September 2023 he released Man's a Wolf to Man (BMG), his first solo album in more than 30 years. In early 2025 he said a newer targeted treatment had left him asymptomatic and no longer classed as palliative. In February 2025 the band said publicly that they are with him.
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