Huey Lewis is finally dispelling the rumors about Michael Jackson being frustrated with him during the making of the 1985 hit “We Are The World.”
During a recent interview with People, the singer reminisced about the time they spent in the studio and talked about their friendship. “There was something there and we exchanged messages once or twice,” Lewis said. “He congratulated me on my next record.”
Lewis, 73, also talked about how nervous he was working with the late King of Pop. “[I was] nervous out of my mind,” he recalled. “And one thing I do remember, which is interesting, is that they wanted to do the lead vocal in one pass for the most part because there were, I think, five microphones and they wanted to phase one up while you phase the other out so that the room ambiance matched and everything,”
Lewis added, “And so the first run through Lionel sings, ‘There comes a time,’ and then somebody messed up about, I guess Stevie Wonder did first time. So they went back and did it again. And then Stevie Wonder kind of messed it up a little bit, playfully,” Lewis explains. “Then they did it a third time. Then they got all the way around to Al Jarreau and he kind of fooled around, messed up. So they start again.”
Huey Lewis expressed how nice Michael Jackson was during the recording of the song, even with all of the mess ups that occurred.
This comes at the new Netflix documentary The Greatest Night In Pop premiered in celebration of the single’s 39th anniversary.