The 'Daisy Jones & The Six' music supervisor says Sam Claflin reminds her of John Lennon

• "Daisy Jones & The Six" music supervisor Frankie Pine spoke to Insider about her experience with the cast.
• She said Sam Claflin reminds her of John Lennon because he's "so warm and kind of huggy."
• She also compared Riley Keough to Grace Slick and Suki Waterhouse to Siouxsie and the Banshees.

Much to the chagrin of many '70s rock fans, Daisy Jones & The Six isn't a real band. You won't find Daisy and Billy Dunne in the flesh, belting "Regret Me" into a shared microphone while gazing into each other's eyes.

But if you're Frankie Pine, you've seen Riley Keough and Sam Claflin do just that.

Pine was enlisted as the music supervisor for "Daisy Jones & The Six," Amazon's new adaptation of Taylor Jenkins Reid's 2019 novel. Keough and Claflin stepped into the lead roles as Daisy and Billy, talented musicians with a tortured connection.

Pine worked closely with the cast to hone their musical skills prior to filming, spearheading a "band camp" to turn them into real rock stars. 

"I felt it was really important that we all do these lessons together in one space. A lot of times you don't have that kind of luxury," she recently told Insider. "Because we were making a band, I felt it was super important that the band be together."

Needless to say, Pine got to know the cast extremely well over the course of those months. "Every day was crazy and fun and we cut up a lot," she said, describing the group as "one big extended family."

In bringing these beloved characters to life, the actors were inspired by a myriad of musicians, from Bruce Springsteen to Cher. For the show to work, it's essential for viewers to believe that Daisy Jones & The Six could've been the biggest band in the world.

Indeed, life imitates art. When asked if the cast's real-life personalities reminded her of any specific artists, Pine conjured a variety of comparisons to 20th-century stars.

"Personality-wise, I would say Sam would be probably like John Lennon to me," she said. "So warm and kind of huggy and you feel like you know him, but just kind of this incredible, brilliant actor that just pulls you in the way that John Lennon's music pulls you in."

Interestingly, Claflin's character actually cites the "Imagine" singer as a major songwriting influence.

"For me, it was Dylan and Lennon. 'Freewheelin' Bob Dylan' and 'Hard Day's Night,'" Billy says in the book. "Those men were my guides."

For Josh Whitehouse, who plays The Six's bassist Eddie Roundtree, Pine said he brings to mind the soft-rock band Boston, most famous for their 1976 hit "More Than a Feeling."

"He just has such a big personality and their music was so big," she explained.

She also said Will Harrison (Graham Dunne) reminds her of Radiohead and compared Suki Waterhouse (Karen Sirko) to the British gothic-punk band Siouxsie and the Banshees.

"I would say probably Radiohead for Will," Pine said. "He's so sweet, heady, a little... I guess sweet is the right word. He's somebody that you would just sit down with and totally chill and that's what you do with Radiohead music."

"Suki to me is like Siouxsie and the Banshees, just like avant-garde and different and amazing in a quiet kind of way," she added.

Finally, Pine drew a parallel between Keough and Grace Slick, best known as a member of the '70s psych-rock band Jefferson Airplane and both of its successor bands, Jefferson Starship and Starship.

"I know that there's a lot of comparison to Stevie Nicks but Grace Slick was one of the first real ballsy rock and rollers, and I look at Riley as ballsy onstage in the way that Grace was," Pine said.

"Not super flamboyant. Not wanting that kind of constant attention, and that's just very much Riley's personality," she continued. "She's so incredibly amazing. But a lot of it she just doesn't care about, you know what I mean? She just does it because she loves doing it."

As Insider previously reported, Pine said Keough's live vocal takes can be heard in several key scenes, including a climactic concert in episode eight.

"We had so many months of band camp that they actually were playing the songs. It wasn't like they were just miming or anything like that," Pine said of the cast's on-screen performances. "All the instruments were on, everything was being played out loud. So we were there to capture everything and anything."

"They are the perfect and sweetest bunch of actors I've ever worked with," she concluded.

"Daisy Jones & The Six" is available to stream on Amazon Prime. Follow along with our coverage here.