Was Andrew Really Rushing? Fact-Checking the Reality and Musicology Behind 'Not Quite My Tempo'
By Alexander Ross
Sound designers, YouTube musicologists, and percussion educators have spent years pulling apart the studio band rehearsal track. If you bring the film audio into a digital audio workstation (DAW) and align the transient spikes of the snare and ride cymbal against a 215 BPM grid, a surprising technical reality emerges: the studio mix does not audibly rush or drag.
Behind the scenes, the music heard in the film was recorded primarily by veteran big-band drummer Bernie Dresel, working alongside composer Justin Hurwitz. To maintain tight synchronization across multiple camera angles, Dresel tracked the session to an unyielding click track. When Miles Teller sits at the kit miming Dresel’s stems (supplemented by Teller's genuine snare fills), the underlying track is metronomically square.
Damien Chazelle crafted an intentional ambiguity. To an untrained audience, the music sounds electrifying and coherent. To Fletcher, it is deficient. This divergence illustrates a central theme of the narrative: Fletcher’s critiques operate in a realm where subjective cruelty masquerades as golden-eared perfectionism.
Alexander Ross has covered the video game industry for a decade, writing deep dives on game design, esports tournaments, VR developments, and gaming culture.
