Zoe Ball had first play of Freddie Mercury’s new single this morning just after 8AM, on her BBC2 Breakfast show. Before playing the song she spoke to producer and long-time friend of Freddie, Dave Clark.
Zoe Ball & Dave Clark on release Freddie Mercury ‘Time Waits For No One’ 20/06/2019
– https://youtu.be/Zf-Uukg17n8
ZOE BALL: … Disco Inferno. Nine minutes past eight. You’re listening to The Breakfast Show. Morning guys. Next up we have the world’s exclusive first play of a previously unreleased track from Freddie Mercury which has been buried in the vaults for almost four years. On the phone now is a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, lead singer, drummer and manager of one of the biggest British Invasion bands of the 60s, who was there in the studio with Freddie for the incredible recording.
Good morning, Dave Clark.
DAVE CLARK: Hi Zoe. How are you?
ZOE: I’m really good. Honesty Dave, I’m such a fan, it’s a real treat to speak to you today.
DAVE: My pleasure.
ZOE: How are you doing Dave? Are you well?
DAVE CLARK: Good, really good.
ZOE: Excellent stuff. So how did you end up working with Freddie in the first place?
DAVE: I met Freddie in the 70s and, and sort of got to know him then and in the 80s I was doing a musical and I remember seeing, the first time I saw Freddie, was in Hyde Park and I was stood on the side of the stage and he was just magic, amazing, and then when I was doing a musical I spoke to the record company and said: “You know I got, had recorded Stevie Wonder and lots of people and I said I love Freddie’. They said: “ You’ll never get him”. So his girlfriend gave me his telephone number in Munich so I phoned him and it was wonderful, you know. He said: “Come on over”, and I said: “Well as long as there’s no obligation”, and he was amazing.
ZOE: Fantastic. Wow. These stories I mean they’re just such brilliant rock ’n’ roll stories. So what, what was it about, ‘cos Freddie did agree to do the recording – what did it make, what is it about this recording and that has made you want to revisit the audio from back then. Dave? … …
DAVE: Well it’s a long story, Zoe. When we first recorded it, I went to Abbey Road and we run through with just Freddie and piano and it gave me goosebumps. It was magic. Then we got down to recording the track and with Freddie and John Christie and another guy, we put 48 tracks of voices on the track, which had never been done in Abbey Road before, and then the back whole backing and it was 96 tracks – and he was fabulous and the song sold over five million records and it was great. And then but I still felt there was just something about the original rehearsal. So a decade later I got my engineer to go down and try and find the original and we couldn’t find it and this went on for several years because, of all the 96 tracks, it was the very first run-through and it was hard. Anyway we found it in 2017 and I got it together with Mike Moran, who played piano and I was really pleased with it. You know, it just had that thing that gave me goosebumps when I first heard it.
ZOE: That’s amazing. 96 tracks, thinking about that, that’s a lot of digging to find. That was taken from “Time the Musical”, which was such a spectacle at the time – amazing special effects. Cliff Richard was in it. I saw Cliff Richard in it actually.
DAVE: Oh, great.
ZOE: And so now you sort of found the soundtrack again, would, how about reviving the performance for the West End? Would you bring “Time” back to the West End?
DAVE: Who knows. That wasn’t planned, I mean there’s not such a thing as you know Zoe as never ever. I was … I love the show, you know, and Laurence Olivier who was an absolute dream who Freddie loved, you know.
ZOE: Oh my goodness. I mean and you were such a great friend of Freddie’s and in the last year his legacy has been put firmly back in the spotlight with the release of the film “Bohemian Rhapsody”. What do you think he’d make of all the attention?
DAVE: He’d have loved it. He would have loved it. I mean the idea, you know, the thing of getting that Oscar and a Golden Globe and a BAFTA and everything else, he would have been smiling, you know. It’s, it’s amazing and he deserves it. I mean he was, well, one of the best singers I’ve ever worked with, and as a person he was, he was innovative, as you know, and that’s great for our industry.
ZOE: Very much so. Dave, so lovely to speak to you. Dave Clark, you’re an absolute legend yourself as well. A real treat to speak to you on the show this morning and well done for finding this. This is wonderful. We’re going to play for everybody now this ‘Time Wait for No One’ by Freddie Mercury, and it will be available for people to download to buy from 8:30 this morning. Dave, thank you so much
DAVE: Thanks Zoe, appreciated.
ZOE: … for this special story a wonderful Dave Clark and here he is Freddie Mercury
< Plays track ‘Time Waits For No One’ >
Absolutely magical, Freddie Mercury ‘Time Waits for No One’ and thank you so much to Dave Clark for speaking to us today and that song if you want to buy it you, can get it from 8.30.