2xCD set with some previously unreleased tracks. Jewel case & card sleeve.

Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Astradyne
2. New Europeans
3. Private Lives
4. Passing Strangers
5. Sleepwalk
6. Mr X
7. Western Promise
8. Vienna
9. All Stood Still

Disc 2:

1. Sleepwalk
2. Waiting
3. Face To Face
4. King's Lead Hat
5. Passionate Reply
6. Herr X
7. All Stood Still
8. Alles Klar
9. Keep Talking
10. Sleepwalk
11. All Stood Still

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9041 in Music
• Released on: 2008-09-29
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Original recording remastered, Extra tracks
• Dimensions: .26 pounds

CD Description
VIENNA is one of those rare albums that defines an era. In their first
incarnation, with singer John Foxx, Ultravoxmerged post-punk and
art-rock in a prescient, highly influential manner. After Foxx's
departure, the band's future seemed in question. Against all odds, they
gained a new lease on life with former Rich Kids singer/guitarist/songwriter Midge Ure, who led them towards a more
stylized,elegant sound full of both accessible melodicism and grand,
sophisticated electronic textures. Consequently, VIENNAdid much to
jumpstart both the synth-pop scene and the New Romantic movement of the early 1980s.Even the band's Bowie-influenced, modernist image on the front cover spawned a thousand imitators. Image aside, though, such durable singles as "Sleepwalk" and the title track show the band at its peak, turning out a uniquely European brand of futuristic pop-rock
bearing both shiny surfaces and deeper satisfactions.

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Customer Reviews

Fantastic music, disappointing package.
This will be the fifth time I've bought Vienna; vinyl and cassette way back in the Summer of 1980 (yes, I am that old), the original CD release in the 90's, the recent(ish) expanded version and now this, the "Remastered Difinitive Edition".

Well, there's not a lot to say about disc one apart from: it's the best post-Foxx album by miles. Not only do you get the classic (and that term really is apt here) single "Vienna", you get a couple of `should have beens' in "Sleepwalk" and "Passing Strangers" and one `why choose this as a single' in "All Stood Still" . The album starts off in fine fettle with the absolutely fantastic instrumental "Astradyne", an immense seven-minute synth extravaganza. Apart from the throwaway "Mr X" there really isn't a bad track on here, with "New Europeans" being a particular highlight. SO, if you've never heard this album before you'll in for a real treat.

If, like me, you bought this CD purely for the bonus disc then, like me, you maybe a tad disappointed. Why? Well, we've been here before haven't we? The b-sides have already appeared on the excellent but long-deleted "Rare" CDs AND on the previous expanded incarnation of this album. In fact, the only unreleased material you get is a couple of rehearsal recordings of "Sleepwalk and "All Stood Still". Historically interesting perhaps, but hardly essential and certainly not worth the price of buying this CD.

Another disappointment is the booklet; some nice photos maybe, but extremely thin with no insight or comment from any of the band. Compared to other remastered releases (particularly the excellent Thompson Twins releases on Edsel) this is a real let-down. OK, so if material doesn't exist in the archives then you can't add it to anything, but this smacks of a cash-in, rather than being a truly essential release. OK, so it's nice to have the b-sides on one CD, but still...

Now, before you have a pop, I'm certainly NOT having a go at the music, Ultravox were truly magnificent on this album, it's just that the overall package smacks of bandwagoning.

Five stars for the music, two for the package.

Vienna definitive remaster 2xcd 2008
ultravox - vienna definitive remaster 2xcd 2008
=======================================================
well,

we find ourselves here again..
listening to 'vienna'.... haven't we done this before?

why yes, we have.. way back in 1980, did we have this
on cd? no, we had to wait until about 3 more years to
hear this..and the quality was decent back then..

but around 92, it came out again, and there was a special
release in a blue plastic longbox also...i don't think
they were remastered though..

again, in 2000 it was re-released, this time a remaster,
with 4 extra tracks, and multimedia tracks....that was
it, or so we thought..

and now here we are , yet again, in 2008, with another
release in a 2cd definitive collectors package, not
only on CD, but digitally released also...

was it worth it, after 28 years?

to tell you the truth, i discovered 'vienna' pretty
late...since i lived in the US, we had very little
exposure to ultravox's music... i saw a video for
'dancing with tears in my eyes' on MTV back in 1984,
and was hooked from them on, getting 'lament' first,
and working backwards through 'quartet', 'rage in eden',
and lastly 'vienna'.....

to me it was a very good album, but not great, and
i rarely listened to it, preferring the more current
albums at the time..

however it did have an appeal with several of the
tracks having a very 'classic', and 'electronic',
'new romantic' sound to it..especially vienna..

it's not my favorite album, maybe its 3rd on the
list... but i do dig it up from time to time..


so lets talk about specifics: for the album
====================================================

1) the album is not overly loud, or 'over mastered',
however, compared to the last remaster in 2000, its
not completely apparent how different the changes are.


2) the soft passages, like the album intro in 'astradyne'
are clear, and free of hiss, and noise..

i'm listening through altec-lansing speakers, and also through
headphones

3) the louder parts do not sound distorted,

4) tracks are complete and not missing parts


the bonus disc:
===================================================

1) well the bonus disc is decent enough, however there's
very little that you haven't heard before, almost every
track was already released via another compilation, or
the 'rare' releases, so don't expect much here..

2) the first track 'sleepwalk(early version)' is very
similar to the original version, with a few tweaks,
nice to hear, but not the impressive

3) the 'all stood still (12 inch)' is nice, but was on
the extended cd...

4) only the last 3 tracks have some interesting parts..
'keep talking(cassette)' of course is a low quality
recording of an early track from the 'all stood still 12',
as b-side...this is an interesting but frantic instrumental..

5) the last 2 tracks are live versions of 'sleepwalk' and
'all stood still'..recorded from rehearsals, and sound
pretty good..

===================================================

i think fans will rediscover this album, if they
haven't heard it in a while, and it sounds great...

however, if you had the previous remaster, unless
you have sharp hearing, or a great sound system,
and do not have the bonus tracks, you probably
will give it a pass..

the packaging is great, and with the added bonus
of downloading the booklets from the website a
lot of care went into this...

the bonus disc is not that great, and probably
could have used some rarer tracks, and alternate
material that wasn't available, however there
might have been limitations on the material
included, which accounts for the selection..


overall, its a decent package, not great,
but not bad.....depending on what you are
looking for, replacing an old copy, or
getting anothers collector edition, you'll
probably be happy.. if you're a hardcore
collector, you might pass on this, and
wait for more rare material in the future..


later
-1

Exceptional but a loss of two stars for no attention to detail
Like many reviews before, this masterpiece from Ultravox needs no further discussion re: music content; although I would say "Western Promise" is totally outstanding and is segued seemlessly into the title track. I agree that "All Stood Still" should not have been a single but back in 1981 there was pressure from the record company, Chrysalis, to keep the momentum of the buying public soon after the success of Vienna the single. Infact "All Stood Still" was released as a single when "Vienna" was still in the upper reaches of the chart. The 12" version, here on disk 2, is a much better mix than the edited single. I always felt "All Stood Still" didn't belong on the original LP and something tells me the early pressings did not include it.

This digital remaster is exceptional but is marred by the absence of sleevenotes. Surely, should we not have received new retrospective notes detailing the precise origins of the songs, concept development and recording sessions that led to what effectively became a sharper Ultravox in the post-Foxx era? I am sure Midge Ure has been interviewed down the years regarding the Vienna project but even a precie of these would have gone someway to justifying yet another reason to buy the album.

Finally, the extra disk is useful. "Herr X" is merely work in progress and the early "Sleepwalk" is fairly tiresome, but "Passionate Reply" is very timely brought back to our listening ears after nearly 30 years as this was the original b-side of "Vienna" the single; so well done EMI for digging this out and remastering the lost classic b-side.