Dylan was VERY involved in the new TOOM mixes. I read an interview with the engineer involved, who said Dylan approved every mix, rejecting the engineer’s mixes that didn’t create the sound Dylan was looking for (he never liked the sound of the original TOOM).
One thing Lanois did in recording TOOM was tape Dylan’s voice in two manners: one track directly from Dylan singing into a microphone, a second with the mic’s signal sent to a guitar amplifier, the sound of Dylan’s voice coming out of that amp recorded on a separate track. Lanois then used both tracks when doing his mix back in ’97, blending the two to create a single sound.
As an aside: This information perfectly illustrates why Harry Pearson’s command that a hi-fi shall reproduce the sound of live music is absurd when it comes to studio recordings of Popular---i.e-non Classical music (excluding perhaps Jazz recorded in the 1950’s and 60’s). What do you high-end audiophiles think of a recording made in this fashion?
Spend as much as you want on your system; it will never sound any better than do the recordings you play through it. The majority of my favorite music doesn’t really justify having a high-end system. To reproduce what---a low-fi recording? My Hank Williams LP’s and CD’s sound like sh*t, yet the music still manages to thrill me. Luckily, some was well recorded, like The Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, and early RCA Records Elvis (his Sun Records recordings are not good, but the music of course is).
The new remiix engineer did something similar to what Lanois did, but somewhat different. He originally used only the direct mic track, and Dylan didn’t like the result (guess Bob is as critical of his voice as are his detractors ;-) . The engineer came up with the idea of sending the mic track to a cassette deck (the identity of the deck undisclosed ;-), playing the cassette recording on monitor speakers (again, undisclosed. Hopefully not the dreadful Yamaha NS-10 ;-) and recording the sound coming out of the speakers, then mixing that track with the direct-mic track. Dylan liked it! THAT is what you are hearing in the new mix.
