Excerpts from an e-mail discussion about 'Head Music':
"I've given 'Head Music' two re-listens now ... with another pass at the b-sides for good measure. I'm still not entirely sure I get the disappointment - but, of course, I don't have the intense love to be massively let down either. There's plenty to pick on the album for - it's overlong, not sure what it wants to be, paced strangely, the peaks aren't as high and there aren't as many, etc. - but the constant bitching from people about how it's lazy - especially the lyrics - are just annoying. How are the lyrics to "Elephant Man" or the old standby dog to kick while they're down "Savoir Faire" any more banal than "Trash" or "Beautiful Ones", and no one picks on them ... people wanted them to fail so they did.""The temptation to make it a better album through editing and sequencing - though I'm still convinced they got the first five tracks right if you're assembling a 10-track album out of the material - is still there, but after spending more time with it as a whole era, part of the point is that it is too long for its own good and kind of falls apart at the end. Dare I say it - I feel about it how I perceive others to feel about 'Dog Man Star'. There, I said it. I feel better. Love the flaws...although even I don't think I could bring myself to call it anything close to a "masterpiece" as fans claim about the sophomore album ... Even with re-sequencing and perhaps exchanging some album tracks for b-sides, I don't think they stuck to one style enough to make even a consistently amazing 10-track album that doesn't feel jumbled together. A riddle to be cracked, but like an inept mystery writer - or, perhaps, one too out of his mind on crack to know what's going on - we weren't given all the pieces.""They got the singles right, I'll give them that. I'm not entirely sure I'd be able to pick a fifth single out of the remainders, though "Savoir Faire" would have been a ballsy - and hilarious - "fuck you", especially at the end of the campaign when everyone was seemingly sick of them ... Actually, I take that back - "Asbestos" would have sounded AMAZING on the radio in the middle of a hot summer as a bit of a counter to what everyone else (including the band at the time with "She's In Fashion") would be releasing at the time. Of course, it would have sunk the album even faster as a second single, but in an alternate universe where that doesn't matter it would have been incredible. ""The whole era has a certain feel to it that I can't put my finger on, but there's something about each and every song that very clearly and immediately attaches it to the project. I have no idea what it is - or even if it's a good or bad thing - but the album puts me in a completely different head space while it's on ... I suppose it's good since I love it so much, but I have to admit it does make me a bit uncomfortable as well. A good discomfort?""I saw the connection between "She" and "Killer" (for the first time) last night. I'm not sure how I missed it, but it made me appreciate the band a bit more, that they had been able to sneak that one past me for so long."""Crackhead", "Leaving" and "Let Go" are Brett's pick for best b-sides from the era, and "Dolly" and "Painted People" are apparently his examples to explain that the b-sides weren't always all amazing prior to formatting. Good man."
""Electricity" is still fucking. thrilling. and remains my favorite thing they ever did."
A write up as disjointed, confused and unsure of itself as the album itself. Perfect.
'Coming Up' is perfect. It's where Brett realizes that, at heart, Suede are really just a big dumb pop band and sets out to make their big dumb pop album. It's ten tracks long, which is the perfect length for a pop album, fact. As Mat Osman is quoted as saying in the new liner notes, it is their "album to do your hair to", and that's really about as high a compliment I can think for it.
The album has a certain sound to it, which I will admit took me a bit to come around to. It's produced within an inch of it's life - a bit treble-y, perhaps - and Brett's vocals in particular have so many effects on them that it hardly sounds like him at all. In the grand scheme of things, though, it all works - if you're going for pop perfection, all the flaws have to go. It's a bit like the porn star image version of Suede, if you will, all tarted up and ready to go.
Song-wise, this is the only time that they got the track list exactly right; every song is where it needs to be for maximum impact. There are some amazing songs hidden away on the b-sides, to be sure, but none of them would add to the overall effectiveness of the album if included. Lyrically things get a bit - ahem - lazy, but that also avoids the over-reach that marred the first two albums. This is POP people, we want to hear about filmstars propping up the bar and being the litter on the breeze and shaking our meat to the beat and all that. At the risk of repeating myself - too late - BIG and DUMB and POP are the words of the day and 'Coming Up' delivers in spades...even the "heartfelt" moments compare true love to drug classes and watching car crashes while eating sandwiches.
This is, ultimately, the essence of Suede in 10 easy to digest song-lets. Brett states in the 'Dog Man Star' booklet that if he could only be remembered for one musical document it would be that, but he's a fool - 'Coming Up' is surely the one to be proudest of.
Bonus material time! Seven demos follow the album, and as far as demos go they're an interesting listen. The "Saturday Night" demo is the same as on the original single and I'm fairly certain the "Filmstar" demo is the one from the 7" but I'd have to dig that out to double check, but the others are getting their first release here as far as I can tell. (Actually, "Lazy" and/or "She" may have been released on the flips of some of the cassette singles of the era, but not having them I can't compare. Anyone? Also: CASSETTE singles. Big. dumb. pop.)
Following them are the three left-over b-sides from the 'Dog Man Star' campaign. They're all fantastic - "Asda Town" is a hidden gem as it was left off of 'Sci-Fi Lullabies' and was impossible to track down for a very long time - but they don't belong here. We've gone over that, though... (Side note: "Asda Town" is one of the tracks that was edited down for space constraints and features a very early fade out compared to the original.)
Disc two collects sixteen of the seventeen(!) new studio tracks that were released on the CDs for the five singles from the album - Neil's solo track "Digging A Hole" is missing, but you're not really missing much there. Most of these you probably already have on 'Sci-Fi Lullabies' so you know that many of them are as good as what made the album. (They just don't fit on the album, right? Right.) "Europe Is Our Playground" is the original b-side version not the re-recording from the compilation - I've never really been able to tell the difference but I've also never compared them side by side - and both "W.S.D." and "Feel" get edits for space. "W.S.D." is a real shame as it's a decidedly non-Suede song, a really great groove-based track - that gets a bit lost with the last two minutes of instrumental freak-out getting chopped off, not to mention you miss out on Brett literally going barking mad - while "Feel" is still too long at almost half of its original length.
My vote for best b-side - and, possibly, best overall track - of the era? "Money", no question. Yesterday I commented to a friend how it sounds like 'Too Fast For Love' if the Sunset Strip was located in London, and even though I'm not entirely sure I can tell you what I mean by that, it's meant as a compliment. (UK hair metal maybe? I don't know.) Anyways, that it wasn't chosen as one of the encore b-sides on the recent album gigs is a crime as it would go down a total storm live. (Have they ever done it?)
We only get one extra track this time, a rehearsal room recording of an unreleased song called "Motown". It's a total racket and not much of a song - not that that really stopped them at this point, "Young Men" or "These Are The Sad Songs" anyone? - but it's refreshing to listen to as an un-produced demo after the complete overproduction of the album and b-sides, and it's a nice reminder that this was a band that was re-discovering the joy of playing together again. Like the disc one demos, probably not something you'll listen to repeatedly but it's nice to have.
The DVD gives us the five promo videos and they're all perfect for the album if a bit boring to actually sit down and watch. The best bit is watching Neil in the "Beautiful Ones" video stare at the camera with an "I don't give a fuck" look while holding down one key for an extended period of time. Perfection. There are also extra videos for "Europe Is Our Playground" and "Shipbuilding" - neither are terribly exciting - plus the now standard bonus concerts: the professionally shot gig that the live tracks from the "Filmstar" single came from featuring Neil Tennant, and yet another bootleg quality show, this time from the 'Dog Man Star' tour featuring the live debut of Richard Oakes. Again, it doesn't belong here and the quality on this one is the worst of the shows so far, so that's a bit of a miss even if it does have historical significance. 'Coming Up' is the only perfect Suede album and even though much of the material on this set was already available, this has been my favorite of the remasters so far.
After years of not being able to articulate what exactly it is that bothers me about 'Dog Man Star', it hit me this morning: it takes too long to say what it has to say and, in the process, dilutes its effectiveness.
"But that's the point!", you cry. "It's not the relatively simple pop album the debut was, it's supposed to be big and epic and long and full and all those generally-accepted signs of a 'masterpiece'." Fair enough - but the band, while very talented and full of potentially good ideas, aren't able to pull it off.
The problems start right at the beginning. At its core, "Introducing The Band" is a complete non-song, and dressing it up as a Middle Eastern-inspired tone poem does it no favors, especially since the band clearly as little-to-no experience with or adeptness at said style. Instead of making the listener perk up from the get-go and say: "here is the start of something different and great", it causes me to perk up and say: "good lord, this is ridiculous in all the wrong ways." Remember, Suede are at their best when they're ridiculous - it's what makes their best songs so great, right? - but there's a good and a bad ridiculous and this nonsense is firmly in the bad camp.
It starts the proceedings off on the totally wrong foot and it takes the album a bit to recover. I used to think I did not like "We Are The Pigs" - empty chest-puffing and fake hardness! - but it's actually that I don't like "We Are The Pigs" in context. It's like a sponge, I guess, absorbing everything around it. On it's own, it's actually a pretty snappy little single - a bit of a rougher "So Young", if you will. So, score one for the re-examination.
Finally, things get truly started with the one/two/three punch of "Heroine", "The Wild Ones and "Daddy's Speeding". The latter is the only moment on the entire album where I feel the band steps outside of their comfort zone and is able to pull it off. It sounds like the aftermath of a car crash, daring you to keep listening even though you know something awful has happened. I have no idea how they pulled it off when they screwed everything else up so badly, but well played.
"The Power" is a nice palette-cleanser but is a bit fluffy and very out of place on the album. Seeing that it's the only one that wasn't totally completed with Bernard, I have no problem nixing it. It would have made a lovely non-album single, bridging the gap a bit between Suedes MK1 and MK2, but it wasn't to be.
"New Generation" and "This Hollywood Life" are fantastic stormers that I've always liked, so yay. Then they fuck it all up again with the brick wall of the album, the point I was almost never able to make it past before. First you've got "The 2 Of Us", which could be beautiful except it goes on for way. too. long. Bernard may be a whiz with the guitar but he's - at best - a passable keyboardist so we don't need him banging out basic chords while Brett repeats the same three lines over and over for five minutes. There's a nice break in the song about 2/3 of the way through that would have made a fine stopping point, but again they pushed it too far and ruined it. Way to go. If you can make it through that, you've got "Black Or Blue" to contend with, which is just awful. Again, Brett is a fine vocalist but it's not like he has the greatest voice in the world, so we don't need him pretending he's auditioning for the lead it some opera, singing in a clearly uncomfortable falsetto and trying to hit every note ever discovered all at once. Ugh.
Finally, you're rewarded with something listenable. "The Asphalt World" was hidden from me for years because I could never make it to it. My listening method with these reissues so far has been to tackle the bonus disc first, to give me a little insight behind the albums before I approach them again, and this one on its own was a revelation. While I think "The Wild Ones" is my favorite on the album, I can actually agree with people for once and say that this is the cornerstone.
Of course, they then botch the ending with "Still Life", itself a fantastic song once you strip away the zillion piece orchestra auditioning to score the next blockbuster. On the bonus disc there's an instrumental/orchestral version that works fine as a piece of incidental music - or, perhaps, soundtracking man's exploration into space or something - but as the overblown finale at a patchy attempt at greatness it's just another miss.
Clearly I still don't find this album to be the masterpiece everyone says it is. I don't understand how you can look past all of its glaring faults and find greatness. The band had it in them - there are flashes here just as there were flashes in the first album material - but their reach far exceeds their grasp and they fall flat on their face just as much as they succeed, if not more often.
As far as bonus material, the set delivers a lot but not nearly as much of interest as the first set. (I imagine my view of the album clouds my judgment on that, but there you have it.) There are 5 demos on the main disc, all of which are worth a listen but I doubt you'll find yourself returning to. (Fun fact: some of the original lyrics to "Introducing The Band" were recycled for "WSD".) Disc two - which is actually full this time, so that's nice - collects "Stay Together" and its b-sides as well as five additional b-sides from the album's singles. A few gripes - "Stay Together" is advertised as being the "long version" but is inexplicably has the last minute totally chopped off. (The true full length version would have fit.) Also, did "Eno's Introducing The Band" really need to be included? Yes, it's part of the story and a track that was released, but surely it falls under the "not a full band recording" line that was used to explain the omissions of "Digging A Hole" and "Weight Of The World" on the 'Coming Up' and 'Head Music' sets. That's 16 minutes of bonus disc that could have been put to better use. Finally, the moving of "Asda Town" and the two "New Generation" b-sides to the 'Coming Up' disc to preserve the original band line-up on the set is just nonsense - it's totally rewriting history and does not give the full overview of the album these sets are attempting to give. It was explained as an imperfect solution but that's a total cop-out - they belong here, not with 'Coming Up'.
Following those we've got six additional bonus tracks, ranging from slight - the barely one-minute long French version of "The Power" and the aforementioned orchestral version of "Still Life" - to genuinely interesting - a true outtake in "We Believe In Showbiz" - to the two pieces that have hardcores salivating: original unedited versions of "The Wild Ones" and "The Asphalt World". (Except Brett has said that "The Asphalt World" was edited down from 18 minutes of rehearsal tapes, so the naming is a bit deceptive.)
On the DVD, we've got the much maligned "Stay Together" video (I don't get the big deal, it's clearly better than some of the first album videos), the 'Dog Man Star' tour films (they claimed they were previously unreleased on DVD but weren't they an extra on the 'Introducing The Band' DVD?), plus a pair of fan-shot bootleg videos. The first comes from a show at the end of the first-album tour and features early versions of "This Hollywood Life", "We Are The Pigs", "New Generation" and set-closer "Stay Together". Like the video on the first set, there are cuts between songs and the audio is not great, and in this one you can tell that songs are clearly cut as you get the last 10 seconds or so of "She's Not Dead" before they begin "So Young". Perhaps the footage was unusable? A little clarification would have been nice. The other set is a four-song acoustic in store from earlier the same day - the highlight of which is Brett getting visibly pissed off and screaming at the crowd to "FUCK OFF!" to constant requests for "I Want Your Sex". Fantastic.
It's often wondered what could have been if the band had been able to hold it together and the Anderson/Butler partnership had expanded past these two albums, but I've never once cared: if they had, it's very doubtful we would have ever gotten their true masterpiece, which is coming up next. (HA!)
One of the features on the DVD portion of the 'Suede' Deluxe Edition is a live performance from the week after "Animal Nitrate" was released as a single and, therefore, about a month before the album itself was unveiled. The recording itself is a bit of a disaster - captured from presumably the back of the club by a hand-held video camera, it continually zooms in and out on the stage. Sometimes it focuses in on one individual band member - usually Brett, prancing around the stage initially in a lacy white woman's blouse until the audience rips all but a sleeve off, which he finally removes himself and throws to the screaming throng, itself unintentionally hilarious and worth the price of admission alone - and sometimes capturing the heads of the crowd frantically bobbing up and down excitedly to the band giving it their all. Despite not being what you'd expect from a professionally produced product - the audio is quite muffled and clearly not even remotely touched up in the studio, there are sharp cuts between songs presumably to save battery and/or tape space, the video itself ends halfway through "To The Birds" leaving the band in a permanently unfinished performance - for me it is the best part of the package. Watching the video, the excitement of the band at the time finally sunk it, I finally understood why they mattered. Even watching on a television screen while sitting on a couch 18 years after the fact, the energy of the band was captivating and I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. Even more important than that, the promise of the band was there - they had, at the time, released three incredible singles backed with six impossibly strong b-sides, and almost all of the "new" material played during the set suggested they were going to carry it through to the full length.
Except, of course, they didn't. Another feature on the DVD is a modern interview with Brett and Bernard about the album and its creation, and one thing they mention is the important of the singles and particularly b-sides at the time and how that tied their hands a bit when it came to assembling the album. While it certainly wouldn't have been unheard of to re-use one or two of the b-sides from the first two singles on the album, they wanted the singles to stand on their own and were now faced with writing songs as good as "My Insatiable One", "To The Birds" (both called out as songs Brett wishes he could have put on the album) and "He's Dead". Everyone involved seems to think they were able to, but the continual mention of "I wish such-and-such had been put on in place of this or that instead of relegated to b-side status" suggests that they weren't quite as successful as they'd like to think.
Here's the thing, though: I now also understand that the imperfection of the album is part of what people love about it. You're not supposed to get everything right the first time out - even a band wish the promise, talent and vision they clearly had at the time are bound to fuck something up.
This package gives you the whole picture. The admission that they had painted themselves into a corner and this was how they chose to get out opened my eyes a bit to the album, and I can see it how they and others have seen it for years. It's a bit like Smashing Pumpkins' 'Gish' in a way - far from perfect with obviously lower quality material being put on in place of stronger, previously released material, but an incredibly honest picture of a young and talented band. It's never going to be my favorite Suede album and I still don't understand the strong emotional connection people seem to have with it - it's a series of over-the-top glammed-up pop songs about sex and drugs when you boil it down - but I can appreciate it in a whole new way after spending more time with the era.
Bring on 'Dog Man Star'.
Going on thirty years ago, if someone had told you that not only would Duran Duran still be around but that EMI would be issuing lavishly packaged (and fittingly period-appropriate) deluxe editions of their first five albums - first five! they survive past the first? - there's no way you'd believe them.
However, here we are in October 2010 and that's exactly what has happened. Rolled out in waves over the course of the past year, we have now been treated to multi-disc and -format editions of the five albums that Duran Duran - and, later, Duranduran - put out during the 1980's. In a very pleasant surprise, they were - for the most part - put together by someone who clearly did their research and offer plenty of bang for your buck...especially when you take the digitally available supplementary material. That's right - 2 CDs and a DVD a piece can't hold all the Duran-ness. Nerd alert!
The first to show its face was a 2-disc set of 'Rio' last Fall, which I've been over before. Pretty much everything about the set was perfect and gave high hopes for the rest.
Unfortunately, it was a bit of two steps forward, one step back from then on out. The first self-titled LP and 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger' joined us in the Spring and the cracks were already starting to show. First, the bad: the sound quality on these things is pretty wretched. Now, I'm no hardcore audiophile, though I am less than pleased with the so-called "loudness wars" and these things suffer big time. Forget taking it to 11 - this is taking it to about 15. And on top of that, there's the small matter of an audio glitch at the beginning of "Girls on Film" that causes a very noticeable stutter and false start to the track - something that would've taken about 15 seconds for QC to trim off with an audio editor. (Hell, I did it myself.) Even worse is EMI's knowledge of the error and refusal to fix it as it isn't part of the music or something like that. I beg to differ.
Anyways, if you're looking solely for an audio upgrade of these two, save your money. If you're looking for bonus material, boy are you in luck...for the first album, anyways. Disc one collects the period b-sides - all excellent, all readily available on the 'Singles 81-85' box and/or 3CD set, but all nice to have in one place. CD2 collections two sets of pre-album demos - no previously unreleased songs, but the demo of "Tel Aviv" is very, very different from the moody instrumental that we know and love - a BBC Radio Session with an early version of "Like An Angel" as a highlight, and a pair of extended mixes a piece for the album's two biggest singles. If you spring for the 3-disc edition, you also get a DVD with - *deepbreath* - the album's videos (including DVD debuts for "Careless Memories" - SO DATED - and "Night Boat"), a fluff day in the life featurette, and - best of all - a whole slew of period TV performances. Seriously, the Top of the Pops performance of "Planet Earth" makes the whole set worth it. The hair! The miming! Did I mention the hair! I mean, really, Simon has one little strand of his bangs crimped - amazing. It has to be seen to be believed. (I can say with all honesty that despite the pretty terrible sound and completely unforgivable audio glitch, that one performance made the whole purchase worth it.) On top of all of that, the whole thing comes packaged with five 5x5 postcards - one for each band member, obviously - and a replica of the poster that apparently came with the original Japanese LP, all packaged in a nice lift top box.
I really, really wish I could lavish similar praise upon 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger', my favorite Duran Duran album. (Yeah, what of it?) While there are no obvious audio glitches on the main album, it still suffers from insane brickwalling so an audio upgrade is out. It doesn't, however, have the bonus material to make it a must-have. There's a second disc, of course, but it is made up almost entirely of tracks available in the previously mentioned singles box - the only new to CD material are a pair of live tracks from the US "Reflex" 12". No demos, no newly unearthed alternate mixes, nothing previously unreleased at all. Rumors of a set of demos for this album have floated around for years and this would have been the perfect time to roll some of those out. Boo!
The DVD is also not nearly as exciting. Similar to the first DVD, it contains the album's videos (all of which were on 'Greatest') and a pair of Top of the Pops performances for "Is There Something I Should Know" and "The Reflex". By this point, though, the fame machine has obviously taken its toll on the boys and these performances are nowhere nearly as fun to watch - you can very clearly see they're just going through the motion because they've made the charts yet again. Rounding out the DVD is the digital debut of 'As The Lights Go Down', the concert-only version of the "Arena" movie. I'm personally not a big fan of watching concert films so my enjoyment of this one was limited - I watched it for a bit before ripping the audio and adding it as a third disc to the playlist on my iPod. It does come in a similarly nice box to the first album, so that's a plus, but I can't really recommend this one.
Both of the sets are supplemented in the digital world with a period concert. Sadly, the 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger'-era choice was merely an audio version of 'As The Lights Go Down'. However, I would highly recommend the BBC concert chosen to represent the debut - "Late Bar" and "Khanada" both get airings, as well as an early version of "Last Chance On The Stairway". Well worth the $10 for the download.
If 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger' is my favorite Duran Duran album, 'Notorious' is a close second and it received the deluxe treatment a few weeks ago. It was rumored a few years back for its 20th anniversary, so we've - or, I've - been waiting for this one for a while. Similar to the 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger' set, the audio portion of the release offers nothing in the way of previously unavailable material. It does, however, provide the CD release of the main mixes from the "Mastermixes" 12", which is nice to have. (The dubs are available digitally - more on that later.) DVD-wise, there's the period videos (DVD debut for "Meet El Presidente"), a TOTP performance of the title track (which is more fun than the 'Seven'-era performances but still not up to those around the debut) and the 'Working For The Skin Trade' concert film. A pair of group shots replace the departed Taylors on the postcards in the box - thank you for some level of consistency, even if everything doesn't match up - and you've got a very nice package for an underrated album.
There is a bit of a bright spot - and I mean a bit. The sound quality has been fixed...kind of. They're still brickwalled, but the kind folks at EMI have very nicely dropped the maximum level a few dBs so they're not as loud. Well, it's a start, though still not a worthwhile audio upgrade.
Finally, 'Big Thing' joined the group along with 'Notorious'. I can't lie - I love this record as well. It's a total mess and doesn't really accomplish what the band set out to do - to be taken more seriously, I suppose - but it's all the better for it. Also, they've restored the original version of "Drug" to the running order, however it was apparently always available as a bonus track on most previous CD editions as the Marshall Jefferson Mix. I think. The wording on exactly what they did here - included in a personal note from John Taylor on one of the sets post cards - is a bit confusing and I'm not entirely sure I got that right.
The bonus material is a bit hit and miss. The good: a new-to-us 7" and 12" mix of "Big Thing" (which, it seems, was going to be a single at one point) and a 6+ minute version of the sole original b-side for the period, the lovely "I Believe / All I Need To Know". The not so good: the tracks that aren't extended mixes of the singles are just edits of album tracks and/or terrible spoken word pieces used in the tour, and they were all in the second singles box. Not a 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger'-esque failure and, to be fair, they were merely collecting what was released at the time, but it is kind of disappointing to be reminded of these things.
The DVD once again collects the videos (DVD debut for "Do you believe in shame?", which was the wrong third single choice if ever there was one) and a new to home video live concert filmed in Milan. On the digital side, there are once again period concerts available - fortunately, neither of them duplicate what's on the DVD this time. Even better, each contains at least one song from at least one of the side projects done Duran-style - the 'Notorious'-era show features Arcadia's "Election Day" and Power Station's "Some Like It Hot" and 'Big Thing' rolls out the latter's cover of "Bang A Gong (Get It On)". Also available this time are remix EPs to collect the mixes that didn't fit on the physical sets. The 'Notorious' EP gets an alternate mix or dub for each of the three singles as well as "American Science" and "Vertigo (Do The Demolition)",
while the 'Big Thing' EP collects the dub of "I Don't Want Your Love' (why, why, WHY wasn't this called "I Don't Want Your Dub"?) and a trio of "All She Wants Is" dubs. They're both borderline overkill - OK, three dub mixes of "All She Wants Is" is totally overkill - but they're nice to have available if you want them.
(It's worth noting that Arcadia's "So Red The Rose" received a similar 2CD/1DVD reissue after the first three but before the last two - chronological correctness! - but it was packaged in a standard fat-boy case rather than a lavish box. Regardless, it collects pretty much everything you could want related to the Arcadia project - I'm not entirely sure there's anything not included but I'm sure someone could prove me wrong - and is worth tracking down as well.)
So overall, a far nicer treatment of the Duran Duran back catalog than could have been reasonably expected and - despite a few issues - a very lovingly and well-put-together set of reissues. I highly recommend all but 'Seven and the Ragged Tiger' - if you're even thinking you want them, you probably do - though can you really have that gap in the middle where it should be? (They're starting to pop up second hand, so that might be your best bet for that one.)
I don't normally say this, but please stop the campaign now. I really don't want to feel pressured into buying a 3-disc set for 'Liberty'.
Excerpts from an e-mail discussion about 'Head Music':
