How Re-Recording Mixer Tony Solis Put Us Into an Accordion for ‘Weird: The Al Yankovic Story’

Weird: The Al Yankovic Story kicks the biopic genre in the nards, and it’s a boldly silly vision of Al Yankovic’s life. Like most entries into the canon, we chart Al’s success through his public performances, and nothing is more important than the sound. There has to be noticeable differences from when Al is figuring out his hook in his apartment with his friends to rocking out with Madonna waiting in the wings. Re-recording mixer, Tony Solis, was tasked with giving us a clear sound while balancing the off-the-wall tone.

When I was younger, I was always struck by the image of Al brandishing his accordion. Even to this day, I’ve never seen an artist look so empowered by holding the instrument. Were they hoping to bring the sexy back to the squeezebox?

“There was one thing that Al [Yankovic] did for us when when I first signed on, and that was to re-record a bunch of his songs. All the songs you hear in the movie are re-records just so I could have the stems for them. I had a stem for the left hand of the accordion and one for the right side, so I mixed the movie in big Dolby Atmos. There are moments where I mixed it so you have certain things hitting certain sides of your ear. I wanted to put you inside the accordion. A lot of what leant itself to the sexiness of it was the effort to make it sound like it was being performed in that particular space. Accordion, by itself, can have frequencies that can be jarring to your ear, so it was all about smoothing it out.”

Al Yankovic is a brilliant wordsmith. He doesn’t just delete one word and insert another. Walk the Line, Get On Up, and Ray are biopics that focus on how the music sounds similar to the original artists (whether performed live by the actors or by using the original music), but Yanovic’s words are important to not just his musical library but to his legacy itself. Making sure the musical sequences appeared like they were being performed live was paramount to Solis and his team.

“We knew that Al, from the beginning, was going to be the one singing. Not Daniel. The biggest thought between him and Eric [Appel] was to make it sound like we were watching the performances live. The songs where Daniel is performing with a microphone, we went so far as to change the sound when he got closer or further away from the mic. Or when he turns his head. That’s volume automation all over the place to make it feel authentic to the screen even if we lose a word or two. People are going to know that it’s Al singing, but you don’t feel like it’s a music montage or a music video. The biggest, and most fun, challenge of the movie was the live performances. With Al’s watchful eyes and ears of being like, ‘it’s almost there,’ really helped. We are in a ridiculous world, but we don’t want you to question the performances.”

Since Weird plays by its own rules, I was wondering how the sound design assists in that department. Solis reveals something key that helps with keeping the story flowing without allowing the film to go off the rails.

“We knew from the beginning that we were going to be dealing with a lot of tones and genres in this movie. It can be a romantic comedy one minute and then action movie and rock biopic. As a re-recording mixer was to find the anchor, and a main one was the dialogue. I could ebb and flow between all these genres. As long as it felt authentic, I can push and pull at will. We would have some sound effects on purpose–some real huge stuff–but then also we would have a gentle moment in the film where Madonna and Al have that tender moment the hallway. Your ear doesn’t question what you’re hearing if you believe the moments in the film as you switch genres.”

Al’s relationship with Rainn Wilson’s Dr. Demento takes a drug-induced turn when Al realizes he eats something laced with LSD. This is a perfect opportunity for Solis to envelop us in sound as things morph on the screen, and he even includes samples of music in the trip. It culminates with Al envisioning a rock star life, shirtless and dripping with sweat…standing inside a huge egg. Naturally.

“That sequence was the longest to mix and it took the longest amount of time. We split the movie into reels and that was close to the end of reel three. My sound designer, Mike James Gallagher, put together a sonic circus of things that gave me so much material for that sequence. Eric and I wanted that scene to build. When Al slowly realizes what he’s eating, I delayed the music from kicking in and those weird vocal details would kick in. Our supervising sound editor, Anthony Vanchure, was really good about how we step into the weirdness and into the big explosion. It’s cacophony. Once we get into the deep pits of hell, it surrounds you, and the biggest challenge with that was to then mix all the characters into it. You have all this crazy sound design flying around you with this orchestral score going nuts. Eric and Al wanted to hear all of it.”

Throughout my conversation with Solis, we kept bringing up how much Al’s music has shaped our childhoods, and I originally was going to close our interview by asking him what other artist’s life he would like to work on if the opportunity came along. I realized that Al’s impact was so singular and working on Weird was so unique that no other musical icon would give anyone such license to mess with his or her life. Solis did want to express how willing Al was throughout the entire process. You cannot make great art without great collaboration.

“I grew up listening to ‘Amish Paradise,’ and I learned more about his back catalog because of that. Just seeing him as a celebrity and working one-on-one was  very cool. I was able to see what a genius he really is. He is so smart about audio and what he wanted for the film. Once of my favorite stories with this movie is that during the ‘Like a Surgeon’ sequence, before it goes off the rails, when I was mixing it, it didn’t feel right. I thought the crowd was lacking or something. Al was on tour the entire time I was working on the mix, and we wondered…could we ask him to record his crowd at his show tonight? We asked him, and he agreed without hesitation. He had a show, but he was willing to stop his show to get us what we needed. A few hours later, I had files. On that scene, when Daniel is doing the ‘is that what you want?’ dialogue, that’s Lincoln, Nebraska. That kind of thing, where he can be so involved and playful for us, it gave me so much more respect for him as a person.”

Weird: The Al Yankovic Story debuts on Roku on November 4.