We knew we had something on our hands that was pretty special.” “When everybody came in the booth to listen to the track, it was magic. “Then I added pianist Paul Griffin and guitarist David Spinozza, and it got very exciting,” Freeman recalls. With McLean on acoustic guitar, accompanied by bassist Bob Rothstein and drummer Roy Markowitz, they nailed a rhythm track for the main body of the song in one confident take. In May 1971, after two weeks of rehearsal, they entered the Record Plant in NYC. They’d be able to approach Don on the same level.” So instead of getting in a bunch of seasoned studio musicians who could knock it out in five minutes, I deliberately got musicians who were good, but weren’t slick, burned-out superstar players. “Don had not really had any experience playing with other people, and he was very leery about it.
“To me, that’s the most crucial thing I did for that whole record,” Freeman says.
Initially McLean wanted to record American Pie with just acoustic guitar, but Freeman “leaned on him” to use a rhythm section.
