The 2014 CLIO Awards will be made even more exciting with the addition of CLIO Music," Purcell says."Blondie's recent tour celebrating 40 incredible years of performing and the frequent use of their music in commercials demonstrates the band's enduring appeal for music lovers and marketers alike.

Their instincts, attitude and style are just as sharp today, coming off of their 40 th anniversary celebration. Blondie's most recent two-disc package of music released in May 2013 included Blondie 4(0) Ever,a greatest hits album saluting their storied past and a new project, Ghosts Of Download, a 10 th studio album, recorded almost immediately following the completion of the acclaimed 2011 album, Panic Of Girls. Blondie's impact is greater than the sum of their record sales: Harry's persona, and the band's boundary-pushing pop, has shaped the look and sound of many chart-topping artists who followed in the last three decades.

Through his acclaimed photography, Blondie co-founder and guitarist Chris Stein intimately and inimitably captured these past 40 years. On September 23, Stein will release a electric and stunningly beautifully rendered new coffee-table book of his photography and anecdotes entitled Chris Stein/Negative: Me, Blondie, and the Advent of Punk on Rizzoli.

A few people are key to Brand Genius, beginning with senior editor Robert Klara, who each year trains his considerable research and reporting talents on the pursuit of the year's standout marketing achievements and the individuals behind them. Once we select our honorees, the execution€"the assigning, editing, shooting and designing€"fall to executive editor Tony Case and executive creative director Nick Mrozowski. I think you'll agree that their work on this year's profiles and portraits is truly exceptional.

This year, we expand the Brand Genius franchise with Brand Save, which spotlights the best in cause marketing. By way of a yearlong program, the award aims to marry brand innovation with the goals of the worthy recipient. This year, we honor (RED) and its remarkable quest to end HIV/AIDS in eight African countries.

The notion of Brand Save was born last year at a panel I moderated during Creative Week in New York that focused on (RED)'s AIDS-free generation initiative and included (RED) CEO Deborah Dugan, Bank of America head of brand marketing Meredith Verdone and Hill Holliday evp, group creative director Spencer Deadrick.

The CLIO Awards is one of the world's most recognized awards competitions for advertising, design and communications. The CLIO Awards has maintained its original commitment to celebrate and reward creative excellence, honoring a powerful form of communication and its impact on modern culture. At the same time, the CLIO Awards remains focused on evolving with the industry in order to acknowledge the most current, breakthrough work. To this day, CLIO's iconic statue is the most widely recognized and coveted symbol of the industry's creative accomplishments.

CLIO Music has a media partner in Billboard Magazine, the leading international source for news, trends and innovations in music. The new program recognizes work that demonstrates ahead-of-the-curve thinking in music, including artist self-promotion, music marketing and brand collaborations, as well as the use of music in advertising campaigns.

Advertising Week kicks off in New York today, as does one of the most ambitious weeks in Adweek's history. Along with the jam-packed agenda of the annual industry gathering€"the panels, the parties, the coffee meetings and, yes, the cocktails€"we mark the 25th anniversary of Brand Genius Tuesday evening with a ceremony honoring the year's 10 best marketing executives and hosted by MSNBC anchor Mika Brzezinski. The following night, we will celebrate our sister brand, the Clio Awards, at its annual gala, hosted by the incomparable Whoopi Goldberg.