When I first heard about click tracks I immediately thought it was a contest between people and machines and just as quickly I chose people – any drummer I admired didn’t need a machine generating click track to be in time. This was insulting, nothing more. Maybe when people first got cars they felt the same way about streetlights determining who could go and who had to wait 90 seconds. McLear studios was the big time. Dozens of 87s on heavy moveable stands, tall ceilings like a basketball gym, zillion amps, a B3 organ and Leslie amplifiers (in the plural). The producer wanted the drummer to use a click track. I felt so insulted on behalf of my friend that I took him aside and reassured him I would be onside if he wanted to start a mutiny. But Cleave said “I don’t mind having a click, I like it actually.” This was too preposterous, “It’s like I have a friend in my ear who has perfect time and I can compare myself to him”.
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The longer you live the more you learn to question whatever you think you know.