Rio (Duran Duran album)
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| Studio album by Duran Duran | ||||||||||
| Released | 10 May 1982 7 September 2009 (Special Edition) |
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| Recorded | January–February 1982 | |||||||||
| Studio |
AIR Studios, London ("My Own Way" recorded October 1981 at Townhouse Studios, London) |
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| Length | 42:38 | |||||||||
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| Producer | Colin Thurston | |||||||||
| Duran Duran chronology | ||||||||||
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| Singles from Rio | ||||||||||
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| Professional ratings | |
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| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   |
| Encyclopedia of Popular Music |  |
| Pitchfork Media | 7.3/10 |
| PopMatters | 8/10 |
| Q | |
| Record Collector | |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | |
| Spin Alternative Record Guide | 9/10 |
| The Village Voice | C− |
Rio is the second studio album by the English new wave/synthpop band Duran Duran, originally released worldwide on 10 May 1982. It reached #2 in the UK and #1 in Australia.
The album was re-released in the United States in November 1982. It earned a Gold disc on 1 March 1983, and went Platinum on 26 April 1983, eventually reaching Double Platinum status. It peaked at number six on the Billboard 200 album chart in the US on 12 March 1983, and remained on the chart for 129 weeks.
The first song to be recorded for Rio was "My Own Way", written and recorded in October 1981, and released as a single in November 1981. The rest of the album was recorded in the early months of 1982 at Air Studios in London, with producer and engineer Colin Thurston. "My Own Way" was re-recorded for the album and the newer version is significantly different from the 1981 single version.
The second single, "Hungry Like the Wolf", was released in the UK on 4 May 1982. It peaked at #5 in the charts on 26 June 1982.
The Rio album was first released worldwide on 10 May 1982, peaking at #2 in the UK in its second week of release. The image on the album's distinctive purple cover was painted by artist Patrick Nagel. The cover itself was designed by Malcolm Garrett.
John Taylor takes credit for the title. "[It] was something I had thrown into the mix," he recalled in 2012. He was particularly fascinated with the idea of Brazil, and "Rio, to me, was shorthand for the truly foreign, the exotic, a cornucopia of earthly delights, a party that would never stop."
The band had their own plans and ambitions for promotion. They reunited with director Russell Mulcahy (who had directed the music video for their first single, "Planet Earth"), and planned the release of a full length video album—eleven videos for the best songs off of the Duran Duran and Rio albums. The band travelled to Sri Lanka and Antigua between tour dates to film the memorable videos for the singles "Rio", "Hungry Like the Wolf" and "Save a Prayer", as well as the lesser-known "Lonely in Your Nightmare" and "Nightboat" — the latter video being a creepy zombiefest set on a deserted island.
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