Today on their website Duran Duran announced an all-encompassing repackaging of Arcadia’s 1985 So Red The Rose, arguably the best Duran Duran album never made. Nick Rhodes had hinted towards this release several months ago and I was eager to see if it would come to see the light.

History: Arcadia was one of the DD splinter groups in 1985, at the height of their fame, being comprised of Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes and Roger Taylor. The other remaining DD members joined up with Robert Palmer and Tony Thompson to form Power Station.

This re-release includes the original album as-is and all 20 remixes of the five released singles from the album, plus the soundtrack-only rarity “Say The Word”. Also included is the über-rare long form version of “Rose Arcana”. The shorter (0:51) version, according to legend, ended up on the original lease due to length of tape and vinyl allowed to be released at that time. I don’t know if that is necessarily true, but it does make for good folklore. Also included are all five videos and making-of documentaries for each video.

This project would also mark the last use of graphic designer Malcolm Garrett of Assorted Images for any of their packaging or branding related efforts.

Just for kicks, here’s video of 80s stalwart Max Headroom giving Simon and Nick a hard time:

From the Duran Duran press release, the complete track listing for the re-release is below:

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These items were found in my wallet:

• TriMet bus transfer (from Portland, Oregon)
• DC Metrorail receipt for $4.00 purchased on 11/19/09 at 22:47:13 at 7th & S St, NW (Shaw/Howard University stop)
• Wetzel’s Pretzels Frequent Buyer Card, punched six times therefore receiving a free pretzel (free spot also punched)
• Handwritten banking routing numbers and account numbers, which after a quick search, point to Bank of America routing numbers.

How did these items get into my wallet you ask? I’m not really sure, as I’ve never been to Portland, don’t get receipts for Metro tickets (much less buy one for only $4.00) and don’t even know what a Wetzel’s Pretzels shop is. Another search reveals there are no shops in DC. Then I remembered the other night at the movies,making my way through the concession line when someone said I had dropped something out of the my wallet and I gathered up the pieces of paper on the floor and shoved them into my wallet. It turns out, they weren’t really mine. Maybe I had dropped a receipt of sorts and it fell upon these already lost pieces of information and I hastily scooped everything up without even looking at what it was.

After looking out the window every five minutes this afternoon a Lego shipment finally arrived and I immediately built this sculpture.

Yesterday EMI released a two-CD (also available on LP, but with limited content) Limited Edition of Duran Duran’s seminal 1982 album, Rio. Of course, I already have my copy that I purchased pre-release during last weekend’s trip to New York.

This release contains the original UK album version, the US album mixes, Manchester Square demos (recorded 28th August 1981), non-album singles and B-sides, and Night Version & Carnival remixes and a 56-page booklet.

This is the first time the US album mixes have been published in different formats other than vinyl and cassette from back in the day. There is also an unconfirmed rumor of an actual reel-to-reel release. When Rio was released on CD the UK version was pressed so while it was nice to have the UK version, this meant saying goodbye to the US version once those cassettes went kaput.

Why the different album versions between the UK and the US? While DD was trying to break into America, EMI felt the album needed to be released to appeal more to the American market at the time. From the booklet, written by Daryl Easlea:

“Guitarist Andy Taylor, writing in his autobiography, ‘Wild Boy’ knew the and should listen to their American record company Capitol and remix the album if they were to make it there. “It gave the album a smoother, cleaner sound that went down better with US audiences. We understood that we needed to change our sound for the States, where the music industry spends far more time and money on mixing material” before cutting to the bottom line. “Not that we had much choice: ‘Remix it and we’ll support you, don’t do it and we won’t,’ said Capitol.” It was remixed under established producer David Kershenbaum’s expert ear. The US market’s appetite had been whetted by the Carnival EP in September 1982 (the mini-album including ‘Hungry Like The Wolf’), before the full Kershenbaum version of the album came out, propelling them into the US Top 10 in early 1983.”

So is the difference in these mixes audible? Yes and no. You can tell the difference listening on headphones; maybe at a party over speakers you wouldn’t be able to distinguish which mix it actually is. Still worth the price though, particularly for the demos and the US version of Lonely In Your Nightmare, which contains extra chorus which has never been available anywhere in the post-vinyl era.

If you want to learn everything you’d ever want to know about the many versions of the nine tracks on Rio, check this out. It even makes my head swim.

So while DD is getting 27-year-old albums re-released, two of the Duran offspring are going to take their turn on the stage. Sons of Taylor’s Andy and Roger have formed their own band, “Nite Visions”, in a clever wordplay of their dad’s moniker for their 12″ single recordings, “Night Versions”. Naturally, they have an 80s electronic dance feel to it. You can find out more about them, including a track sampling, here.

It’s now been three months since I was laid off from my job. In these last 90 days I’ve dealt with city and state bureaucracy, shame at the grocery store and extensive amounts of utter boredom. I’ve taken walks halfway across town, sometimes to accomplish errands but sometimes because there was nothing better to do. I’ve seen the sun come up on Wednesday mornings, and not because I’m getting up while it’s still dark, as I did when I was employed. I’ve often stared out of my front door during wet, cold weather, watching traffic and the occasional D6 fly by. I’ve walked to the Metro and back during evening rush hours just to get a sense of what everybody else’s world is still like. I’ve gone to the corner store, without showering for a day or two, at 11:00 in the morning, wondering if they’re wondering why I’m there at that hour.

I know what this experience is like now, becoming accustomed to an unwanted routine. I wonder what the next 90 days are going to hold for me, as I see unemployment benefits terminating, and what happens next? At what point do I start putting furniture and other material goods up for sale on craigslist? At what point do I stand out front during the morning car commute avenue and hold a cardboard sign saying “will blog for food” or “websites while you wait for the red light, $14.95″? At what point do I give everything up and stay with each friend for a night or two and how long can that be sustained? At what point do I (shudder the thought) move in with my Dad? At what point do I abandon everything, seeing how far I can work my way across the country, doing menial jobs without being tracked by a credit card?

Currently, I still have not received this month’s food stamp ration, and while I’m not starving, I’m still hesitant to spend any cash on groceries, hoping everything will be rectified and my deposit that was supposed to he made eleven days ago will go through. I think if it does, I’m going to have a meal that forgoes my usual “buy only what’s on sale and make a meal out of it” mantra and buy some scallops or a porterhouse steak.

Because of some vacation days I had previously scheduled, the last day I was actually employed and in the studio was my birthday. That day we had planned to visit a homeless shelter and cook food for the residents there. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was in charge of frying up the grilled cheese sandwiches; we had decided a hot meal was in order, so we supplied tomato soup and a vegetable soup too. It was a total group effort from the six or seven of us that participated that day. It felt so great serving the residents and they seemed genuinely appreciative.

Now, I wonder if I’m closer to the receiving end of this process than I am to the giving end. Working in a creative field in a non-creative town, it’s hard to see any kind of upswing anytime soon. People I know who work in other fields are still going like gangbusters—DC is weird that way, often recessions/housing markets don’t hit us quite so hard because the government is still going to employ people, and those people need places to live. So those markets never dry up. Providing smart, unique messaging systems for them and the businesses that rely on them, however, is something that is frequently (and often, stupidly) cut from budgets.

So where does this halfway point leave me? Maybe thinking it’s time to stop looking for a comparable job to my experience and take a position that earns half the salary I’m used to making? Doing someone’s crappy temp work on Powerpoint? Waiting tables? Being one of those rubber-gloved guys cleaning out Metro trash cans during rush hour? Coffeeshop barista? Or maybe it’s *really* time to become the joke job of my 2nd year architecture professor: court reporter. Certainly I’ve seen enough late-night commercials where I can earn that degree in 6-8 weeks.

QUICK UPDATE: Mode Project, the same design team that created Obama’s iconic “O” campaign logo, is credited with designing the recovery.gov logo along with a great new Dept o’ Transpo’ project logo. Thanks @katkatkatbobat!

I present these three screenshots.

These originate from the iPhone game KERN, which is kinda fun to play. It’s a speed/timing game that possibly draws more on your eye+hand coordination than it does actual kerning letters but it’s still fun to play. And the game looks great too, obvy built with a designer’s eye.

There was a grammatical typo in the Rules page (1), for which the update was issued. The update (2) says “Fixes an errant apostrophe which caused a fair amount or (sic) typographical embarrassment for our designer. Please accept this upgrade as our apology.” First of all, don’t apologize for having a typo in a sentence where there is a typo. Second, back to the point: as you can see in (3), the apostrophe from “it’s” in line two has been removed to its correct spelling, “its”, after the update. But a typographical problem still remains. Can you spot it in (3)?