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compact collection : information

  • In late 1990, Virgin released a range of Compact Collection box-sets for several artists. These collected together three CD albums and housed them in a clam-shell box.

  • The Simple Minds Compact Collection featured Life In A Day, Real To Real Cacophony and Empires And Dance. To make things more interesting, the CDs themselves were picture CDs – a novelty at the time, although Virgin had already exploited the new technology with the Themes Volumes and Street Fighting Years.

  • The albums were just standard pressings; the rest of the packaging (the CD inlays and backing sleeves) were exactly the same as the normal, standard pressings.

  • It was rather cynical, being just an exercise in repackaging. And the timing of its release was also poor as fans had just bankrupted themselves purchasing the expensive Themes Volumes.

  • Unfortunately it marked the start of a series of releases where albums were collected together and released in a box set. Many similar releases, collecting together different sets of albums, were released through the following decades (which included a reissue of this same box-set four years later).



compact collection: quick reference
3XCD     Compact Collection Virgin TPAK 2
CD    Life In A Day Virgin VMCDP 6
1. Someone(3:40)
2. Life In A Day(4:00)
3. Sad Affair(2:45)
4. All For You(2:50)
5. Pleasantly Disturbed(8:00)
6. No Cure(3:38)
7. Chelsea Girl(4:33)
8. Wasteland(3:44)
9. Destiny(3:36)
10. Murder Story(6:18)

CD    Real To Real Cacophony Virgin CDVP 2246
1. Real To Real(2:47)
2. Naked Eye(2:21)
3. Citizen (Dance Of Youth)(2:53)
4. Carnival (Shelter In A Suitcase)(2:49)
5. Factory(4:13)
6. Cacophony(1:40)
7. Veldt(3:29)
8. Premonition(5:29)
9. Changeling(4:11)
10. Film Theme(2:27)
11. Calling Your Name(5:05)
12. Scar(3:31)

CD    Empires And Dance Virgin CDVP 2247
1. I Travel(3:56)
2. Today I Died Again(4:39)
3. Celebrate(5:03)
4. This Fear Of Gods(7:00)
5. Capital City(6:14)
6. Constantinople Line(4:44)
7. Twist/Run/Repulsion(4:38)
8. Thirty Frames A Second(5:14)
9. Kant-Kino(1:50)
10. Room(2:30)






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