Duran Duran, Decade
Duran Duran DECADE.
Ten years of Duran Duran compressed into one record, from the early New Romantic singles through Bond themes, Nile Rodgers remixes and the increasingly polished pop of the late 1980s.
Album artwork shown for commentary and historical reference. Image source: Duran Duran official website.
SEVEN THINGS
WORTH KNOWING.
A greatest-hits collection can look simple on paper. Decade hides ten years of changing lineups, remixes, soundtrack work and pop experimentation inside 14 tracks.
Duran Duran released Decade on November 15, 1989, with the album and a companion video created to document the band's first ten years.
The standard collection contains 14 tracks, beginning with "Planet Earth" and ending with "All She Wants Is."
Nile Rodgers radically reworked "The Reflex" with sampling and tape-editing techniques, helping transform the song into Duran Duran's first No. 1 single in the United States.
"A View to a Kill" became Duran Duran's second U.S. No. 1 single and remains the only James Bond theme to reach No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
"Burning the Ground" was created to celebrate ten years of Duran Duran by combining pieces of earlier recordings into a new megamix, but it was released separately rather than appearing on the standard Decade album.
Designer Stephen Sprouse created the Decade cover using photographs of the band members pulled from several different photo sessions rather than one unified shoot.
Decade reached No. 5 on the UK Official Albums Chart and spent 18 weeks in the UK Top 100.
WHY THIS
ALBUM MATTERS.
Decade is more than a greatest-hits package. It captures a band moving from New Romantic club culture to global pop stardom while its sound, lineup and production methods kept changing.
Put the songs next to one another and the evolution becomes part of the story.
THE
NUMBERS.
TRACKS
The standard collection summarizes Duran Duran's first decade in 14 songs.
UK ALBUM CHART
Decade reached No. 5 on the Official Albums Chart.
YEARS
The compilation was built around the band's first decade of releases.
THE
PHYSICAL OBJECT.
The Decade artwork feels less like a conventional greatest-hits package and more like a piece of late-1980s fashion design.
Stephen Sprouse was given a large selection of photographs from different sessions and combined them into one aggressively colorful visual identity.
Nick Rhodes later called it one of his personal favorite Duran Duran album covers.
RESEARCH SOURCES
Facts are checked against artist archives, chart records and original commentary before publication.
KEEP
DIGGING.
More recording stories, strange credits, cover art, chart numbers and details hiding inside the records.