Had something cool happen today on the channel. The band commented on one of my remasters. This one:
No idea how many of you know this song but it was some good early 80s New Wave adjacent stuff.
Their comment was:
“Shiny Shiny” back in the light again — sparkling through a new lens. Thanks for treating it with care.
I’m nearing my 700th remaster on this channel, so feel free to give a request if there’s something you’d like me to remaster.
I’ve probably talked some about Oasis on this site and maybe in this thread but am gonna do it again.
As I near my 700th remaster no thanks to almost any of you due to lack of requests (marksman and drchesspain exempted), I decided to do an Oasis song I liked.
My problem with the original, as with all their early music is I felt the supposedly UK indie rock band came off more classic rock than alternative. I had the opportunity to play their first single Supersonic on my radio show toward the end of it. I passed for the reasons mentioned above. I may have played it once but thought it was a very boring song. Part of that is due to the production. To this day, it comes across like it was produced and mixed by an old guitarist with severe hearing damage. The level of the guitars and EQ of the guitars, snare, hi hat, etc. is unbearable to listen to for me. They remastered it so hot as well, which makes all that worse to me.
My first real forced exposure to them was assisting in post sound on a concert film for this album over 31 years ago, which was a story in itself. They basically just turned all their amps to the max and stood like blobs on stage, including Liam who ambles up to the mic like he’s about to pick a fight with it and doesn’t even slightly dance to the music. On stage, they looked worse than the worst emotionless shoegazing bands who at least felt like they were into the music. Now they’re about to be in the rock and roll hall of fame. I do not know if their performances got better. They sounded much better than the album live but it wasn’t anything resembling a performance.
A few months after the concert film I would do the sound design/mix of the Wonderwall video. To this day, it’s one of the few songs I like by them even though Liam’s vocals are like 12dB too loud for the understated song. I guess he just had one gear…loud and screaming.
The reason I’m posting this remaster is to show how different a song can come across when approached differently than the original. I doubt I’d consider this to be one of my best remasters but I brought out every ounce of what was missing for me with this version. If you place yourself into the idea this is recorded in the studio as a live performance it becomes megaimpactful in my opinion. That ‘room’ just feels alive in my version. You obviously need to listen loud to get that feel but it will not split your ears like the official version.
Part of what I was going for was what made me like the song to begin with…the bass line from that concert. It’s growling, loud, and rolling in the concert film. It drives the song and gives it a great energy even if it’s played by statues. The major problem with the original mix is the guitars are way too loud, the bass is way too low, you can’t hear the kick at all, the snare doesn’t sound great or balanced right, and the vocals don’t sit right either. It sounds almost like too cleanly played classic rock, when the writing of the song is almost pure chaos in its broken down form, and I love the underlying chaos. The mix and really producing just kills an otherwise good song. My remaster is basically me producing how I wanted to hear it.
I’m gonna give you three versions, with mine last. I hope it pays off, even though I had no desire to compete with the levels the original had. It sounded grotesque and bad to me, so my version is not intending to compete with that one. It’s a reimagining. The song is Up in the Sky.
The Original (official remaster):
Live Version:
My Version:
And now I drop it into the pile of crickets.
Maybe someone will listen to Billie Jean lol.
Original:
