Albums that exist with very different mixes

Two mixes of Lilys Better Can't Make Your Life Better

the Stevehoffman.tv version of this thread would be 1000 pages long. god bless those guys.

The Alan Parsons Project - "Tales of Mystery and Imagination".

There are two different mixes, the first done in 1976 and the second done in 1987. The 1987 version has some overdubs that are not on the 1976 version. Some of the audio signal processing is different too.

Killing Joke - "Brighter Than a Thousand Suns".

There are two versions, one released in 1986 and another released in 2007. The 1986 version was mainly mixed by Julian Mendelsohn. The version released in 2007 features mixes done by Chris Kimsey.

Head of David - "Dustbowl" versus "The Saveana Mixes".

"Dustbowl" was done by Steve Albini, "The Saveana Mixes" were done by John Fryer. I think the master tapes of the original mixes were lost so that's why they had to be redone.

Radio Birdman' two albums come in two different flavors, both of which can be found in the new box set.

The Verve - "This is Music: The Singles 92 - 98".

This is a greatest hits compilation. Some of the tracks from the bands early singles and EPs ("She's a Superstar", "Gravity Grave", "All in the Mind") have different mixes to make them more sonically consistent with the bands later tracks.

There are also two different versions of The Verve's single "Blue", the original mix and the "USA mix".

Is re-recording complete albums a metal thing?
http://rateyourmusic.com/list/Verminous/re_recorded__re_arranged__re_worked_albums/

sometimes it's a publishing rights thing, see Squeeze and Gang Of Four

These mostly seem to fall in two categories:
- re-recorded demo tracks
- re-recordings due to label problems

It was briefly in vogue for Rock Band- DEVO for instance re-recorded some of their songs because they didn't have tapes of the original recordings they could make stems from.

Southern Culture on the Skids recently rerecorded all of their 1994 Ditch Diggin' album. It's now called "Dig This." Not entirely sure if that was a rights-related thing, or they just felt like a sonic upgrade would be fun.

Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible had a US (or Canadian maybe) mixdown. Instead of the sparser post-punk aesthetic of the UK version the States were treated to lashings of classic rock reverb on everything.

― Willl, Wednesday, November 5, 2014 10:56 AM (8 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

The differences between the UK mix of The Holy Bible and Tom Lord-Alge's US mix are a very good example of just how much the mixing process can alter a record, IMO. I often think that sometimes when people talk about the "production" of a record, sometimes they're actually confusing it with the "mix". Like, both the UK and US mixes of the album obviously come from the same source material, but the feel and overall sound of both mixes couldn't be any more different.

I hadn't heard that Sisters Of Mercy tidbit - are the mixes radically different? Is one better than the other?

The US version of We Are The Pipettes vs. the UK version.

The Enid re-recorded their first two albums roughly a decade after the originals but a few years ago the originals were reissued.

Art Zoyd re-recorded their debut only five years after the original but I think they have stuck with the second version. Sadly there isn't much info about which reissues contain which mix or how different they are.

Sleeve- weren't you unhappy about the new Rudimentry Peni mixes?

nah, that's remastering not remixing

Gerald, yes, they sound quite different. I don't know which one I prefer though, I first had the vinyl, then the first CD sounded weird and wrong, but now, years later, the remaster (which is the first mix I had again) sounds strange again.

There's one pressing of Eric Clapton's first solo LP ("CTH" in the deadwax) that has several tracks with different mixes. It's apparently quite collectible.

I haven't heard them in 20 years, but I seem to remember that the "Deutsches Album" versions of Peter Gabriel's 3rd & 4th albums had some significant differences in the mixes.

I know Spotify is the enemy and all, but this is where streaming services could really useful, offering multiple mixes of albums for easy A-B comparison (with the artists' blessing of course).

One might think, but oftentimes the only one up there is the rerecord