During my graduate studies at Savannah College of Art and Design, I took a class called "Music Mix and Mastering." We were asked to choose from several tracking sessions two songs which we wanted to mix and master.
This track was a collaboration between David Byrne and Brian Eno, and was originally released on the album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. My professor gave me the original files to re-mix for my midterm project. I chose not to listen to the original album version before mixing, because I wanted to prevent it from influencing my interpretation of the song.
This was my final project, and the entire class felt that I had improved greatly from the last project. Some of the challenges of this tune were the overall sloppiness of the recordings, and a dobro solo that was just impossible to use in the condition it was. When the class opened up this track, almost everyone said that the dobro was a lost cause. I saw that as a challenge. After making some small decisions about structure, treatment of individual instruments and so on, I tackled the dobro, and edited together a solo. Once I was satisfied with the dobro comp, I then used it throughout the track to accent and fill. In the end, the class was impressed with how the instrument's recordings had been salvaged.
NOTE: I do not intend to make any financial gain from these songs. They are not for sale or download. These particular versions of these songs were created as part of a class to educate about the mixing and mastering processes. If you like these songs, their originals can probably be found on amazon or itunes.
