Cory Stillman
Most musicians will tell you that Jeff Buckley is among the most underrated guitarists and vocalists of all time, and his legacy as such is all but confirmed in the powerful HBO documentary It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley. Music editor Michael Brake had unprecedented access to all kinds of master recordings, archival tapes, and demos while working on the film.
“When I began, I was given a Google sheet with links to Jeff’s personal archival storage locker that had been digitized and linked with whatever info was on the media,” Brake says. “This was every cassette, DAT, CD, whatever was in Jeff’s possession at the time of his passing. Over 900 pieces of media.”
That staggering number is surely catnip for a music editor like Brake, who last spoke to Awards Radar about his innovative work on The Righteous Gemstones, a decidedly different HBO property. Brake grew up an admirer of Buckley’s work.
“For us Gen X kids, he was the hero and antithesis of the 90s rock world all wrapped up in one guy.”
By the time Brake heard that filmmaker Amy Berg was directing and producing a documentary about Buckley, the Emmy-winning music editor, whose credits also include Barry, Midsommar, and the forthcoming I Love Boosters, knew he had to be a part of this film. While he joined the project in the summer of 2023, the real work began almost a year later, after editors Brian A. Kates and Stacy Goldate had picture locked. One of Brake’s biggest responsibilities was finding a way to deconstruct Buckley’s songs and incorporate them into the film’s score.
Unsurprisingly, “Hallelujah” had to be featured in the film at a particularly opportune moment. The iconic song presented Brake with some unique challenges, however.
“There were two sizeable montages that used it,” Brake says. “And so many people know and love that song. The picture editors had tried to make their own instrumental so I got a sense of the structure they wanted, but there were several rough edits in the editors timeline that needed help. There are gentle time compressions or expansions throughout those montages that still had to feel real. And after watching it in the theater, I’m delighted with how they sound.”
Brake discusses this sequence and several others in our full conversation below, highlighting the doc’s most memorable and tear-jerking moments. Check it out!
1. The last time we spoke, you were deep in the sonic world of The Righteous Gemstones. Now, with your MPSE-nominated work on It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley, you’ve stepped into a very different creative space. What initially drew you to this documentary, and how did it feel to enter Jeff Buckley’s world?
Buckley is one of the greatest artists of the 20th century, no question. For us Gen X kids, he was the hero and antithesis of the 90s rock world all wrapped up in one guy. Who covers Nina Simone, Bad Brains, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Henry Purcell, The Smiths, Edith Piaf… everything he did, he did better and with more heart and soul than anyone else around him. He was the bright flame of my generation, the writer of our psalms – he burned too brightly and we lost him. When I heard about this documentary from an old college friend, I called Amy Berg as soon as possible and essentially begged her to let me be part of this. It was like being given sacred songs and asked to help sing them to the world. It felt important to be a part of.
2. You also mentioned that director Amy Berg spent 15 years bringing this film to life. When you joined the project, what stage was it in creatively, and how did you begin shaping such a long-gestating labor of love?
I joined in the summer of 2023 and Amy was working on a final cut that we hoped to mix later that year. We changed picture editors and went through a few more iterations of her vision. There was a lot of experimentation but by spring of 2024, I started getting segments to watch and do some fixes on, but much of the shaping happened between Amy and the picture editors, Brian Kates and Stacy Goldate. They did such an incredible job. I basically got their locked after and reshaped it. One of the big jobs was to figure out how to pull Jeff’s songs apart to make them into a better score for the film. Most of Jeff’s recordings didn’t have multi-track stems, except for Grace. There were no instrumentals. It made for a ton of extra work to make it all come together. That fall, after we had mixed the film, I met Nate Flaks, an iZotope team member, at the MPSE picnic and had a great conversation about their Music Rebalance tool. It was such a big help. If you go listen to the ending when the film is talking about Jeff’s death, that live song “I Shall Be Released” is a cappella. I tinkered with Music Rebalance almost phrase by phrase to make it exactly what I wanted. And in the end, it’s just Jeff’s voice… carrying his soul to whatever comes after. We added that after the film premiered at Sundance. Amy heard it and absolutely loved it.
3. Were you working primarily from master recordings, archival live tapes, demos, or all of the above? How did the varying audio quality of archival material influence your editorial decisions?
I worked with everything available! When I began, I was given a Google sheet with links to Jeff’s personal archival storage locker that had been digitized and linked with whatever info was on the media. This was every cassette, DAT, CD, whatever was in Jeff’s possession at the time of his passing. Over 900 pieces of media. (OMG!). This includes cassettes he used on his 4-track recorder at home. (OMFG!!). Some were recordings that were commercially available, BUT some were absolute gems that no one else has heard in ages, or ever. Everything had to be listened to and noted. I brought Alex Archipov on as an Assistant Music Editor just to listen to all of this music and note them with me. It took over a month of constant listening by both of us. We were looking for the pieces that were special, different, off the wall, out of this world. And we’d note those. Alex was an organizational genius, and she built a tab called “ALEX’S EPIC SONG FINDER” in our shared Google sheet to track all these gems. SEVERAL of the pieces we found in this storage locker saved our butts in the edit. A harmonium and violin jam session of Jeff & Joan used under the “Anaheim Hell Hole”, as well as a piece of Jeff playing with a voice modulator – there are five overlays in that little moment – all small clips from Jeff’s personal archive. The harmonica piece on the portrait of Bob Dylan in the halls of Columbia Records is actually Jeff playing along with his own song, “Grace” that was recorded on a home 4-track so it was clean and discreet. Just an amazing find! And the feedback under the manic depression section was edited from a 9-minute outtake of Jeff recording solo guitar feedback during the “Grace” recording session at Bearsville Studios – clean, beautiful and probably hadn’t been heard since it was recorded. There were several other uses from the personal storage locker. It was an amazing and amazingly time-consuming gift.
4. How closely did you collaborate with the film’s picture editors when shaping musical sequences?
Unfortunately, a lot less than I hoped when I started. I did a few sequences along the way but did the vast bulk of my work after picture lock. Which means the music editorial was a lot harder and I relied on iZotope RX and Serato Pitch n’ Time Pro to fix editorial issues. Luckily, I was able to make a wish list of multi-track stems from Sony’s recordings of “Grace”. Producer Matthew Roozen was so incredible (and patient) with my massive wish list. I couldn’t get everything I wanted, but what I did get made a huge difference in the soundtrack of the film. So while I didn’t get to work with Brian and Stacy directly that much, I feel like I picked up what they were doing and brought it to life.
5. Were there particular songs or performances that required an especially extensive editorial process? What made them challenging?
“Hallelujah” was particularly challenging, because it was all one mic, one track. There were no vocal or instrumental splits on that. There were two sizeable montages that used it. And so many people know and love that song. The picture editors had tried to make their own instrumental so I got a sense of the structure they wanted, but there were several rough edits in the editors timeline that needed help. There are gentle time compressions or expansions throughout those montages that still had to feel real. And after watching it in the theater, I’m delighted with how they sound.
6. Buckley’s life and career were brief but heavily mythologized. Was there a moment in the film where you felt the full emotional impact of the story while working on it?
I mean, spoiler alert, but the last scene of the film is Jeff’s mom, Mary, replaying the last voicemail he left her. It was so full of love. Mary is crying. And every time I’ve seen the film, I turn and see that everyone in the theater is crying… there’s nothing quite like seeing cinema light reflected in tears. You know you are part of something beautiful.
7. From a purely craft standpoint, what sequence in the film are you most proud of?
The manic depression sequence was a big departure from what the picture editors had done. We couldn’t use Jimi Hendrix’s “Manic Depression” for that long… barely at all. I felt the whole subject matter needed to be taken more seriously. It’s all based on Jeff’s version of “Kanga Roo” by Big Star (instrumental made with Music Rebalance), then overlayed with an edit of the guitar feedback track from Bearsville Studios. I added a couple other low pads I had to really fill out the frequency range on that sequence…those pads held the space and transitioned us through to “Corpus Christi Carol”. Moving from the dark and The Devil to light and butterflies. I love this sequence so much.
8. If you could work on a documentary about any other artist—past or present—who would it be and why?
What a huge question… I’ve worked on docs about some great musicians… but I’d have to say after Jeff Buckley, it’d be amazing to work on docs about music who feel important. A lot think they’re important, but people like J.S. Bach, Prince, Nina Simone, John and/or Alice Coltrane. Artists who changed the world around them and the way we heard music after them.
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