During the mixing of The Underside of Power we used an all analogue desk and a no recall process, which essentially meant we mixed one song at a time, made the necessary changes, and then did a final live mix that couldn't be called back up with modern technology. After that, we moved on to the next song.

This process forced us to make hard decisions and to commit to the way a song sounded, and then live with it. Sometimes it's easy to focus so hard on something that you want to keep tinkering and it's never actually done. This put an end to that journey because if you really wanted to changed even the smallest detail, it meant booking additional studio time, rewiring all of the special outboard equipment that was used on that one particular song, and then starting over from scratch the laborious process of eqing and balancing things until you create an entirely new mix. It's a pain in the ass to say the least.

The Underside of Power needed to sound a particular way, and after we worked up the above mix of the song, we moved on to finish the record. But this version of it didn't feel quite right. At the time I recall we thought it sounded too locked in the 70s Northern Soul origins of the demo. We ended up going through the pain-in-the-ass process listed above, to redo the mix on the song completely, until we got it right.

It's funny, in my mind I recall this version being a lot more dance floor ready and poppy, and the released version ended up a lot more overdriven and glued together. In hindsight, the two versions aren't that much different, but with many years of space this one actually sounds a bit heavier to me.

One of the biggest differences is that the main anchor of this version of the song is the foregrounding of the bass and Suicide-y Acetone drum machine elements. The live drums are pushed more in the background and the guitars sit in a slightly different space, only stepping up during key moments. Listen for extra guitar details in the introduction and then the break between the first chorus and 2nd verse (this part is way wilder). The vocals are a bit further back, less background vocals in the mix and there are more moments of extreme echo and reverb (Listen on the second verse for that). Overall this version feels rawer and less polished, which is a nice thing to hear coming back to it.

Stay tuned for another one of these things next week.