Looks like Microsoft got an awful lot of feedback regarding the UI changes made to the Beta version of Visual Studio 2011... and I'm guessing that most of it was not that positive.
I'm not talking about features in Visual Studio 2011, those changes seem to have been universally accepted (either as 'It's about time!' or 'Wow, that will help alot!'). I'm talking about the changes made to the User Interface and the strict following of the Metro Style Guildelines. The blogging world was mostly negative about the 'dulling' down (lack of color/contrast), the use of all caps for titles to all sections, and the extreme simplicity of the icons (coupled with the lack of color/contrast). I myself found it a little tough at times to navigate around and be sure I was using the right icon (most use keyboard shortcuts anyway) or selecting a class versus some other file type.
Looks like Microsoft really took this feedback to heart and has made several UI updates for the Release Candidate that (for me) seems to have addressed most of these concerns. I will have to give it a spin once I have some more spare time, but my first reaction to the screenshots was positive. Color is back, but only where it helped bring clarity and not color everywhere (which really is distracting).
More details about the changes here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/visualstudio/archive/2012/05/08/visual-studio-11-user-interface-updates-coming-in-rc.aspx
