Midnight Oil

Subject: RE: [powderworks] Malcolm Burn - Breathe producer
From: Michael Blackwood
Date: 28/07/2009, 12:14 am
To: <koala.sprint@gmail.com>, Oils Powderworks <powderworks@yahoogroups.com.au>

1) Why is the mix of Breathe so flat and muddled?  Rarely does any one element of the instrumentation "pop" and catch your attention, which seems an antithetical approach to mixing when compared to the mix of every other Oils album, and to the way the Breathe tracks were played live as well.  (I hope this phrasing doesn't seem rude, I just lack the musical vocabularly to describe my impressions any other way.)
 
2) Have the original recording tracks survived, and would you be curious to see how one of the Oils "traditional" producers like Warne Livesey or Nick Launay would approach the songs?
 
Mike Blackwood
To: powderworks@yahoogroups.com.au
From: koala.sprint@gmail.com
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 2009 08:59:31 +0200
Subject: [powderworks] Malcolm Burn - Breathe producer

 
Hi all,

Malcolm Burn has agreed to answer some questions about his time with
Midnight Oil, producing Breathe in New Orleans.
Breathe is the one album that divides fans. It seemed to have brought
a different audience to the Oils, especially from the US, due to it's
more mellow, acoustic tones.

If you have any questions for Malcolm, let me know and I'll put them to him.
My questions are
How did Emmylou Harris became involved?
How did you end up as the only external person ever to co-write an Oils song?
Why did you end up playing so many instruments on the album?
Was Rob so against this more acoustical musical direction?
Where there lots of discarded songs from the sessions? If so, what
happened to them?

He is on vacation this week but will respond next week, so if you want
to email in questions this week, I'll compile them and post his
responses.

Cheers

Stephen


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