When the Fuegos ended, Cleve moved on — “I just kept working.” In fact, he took a bit of a left turn by joining a popular local reggae band called the I-Tones, then joined a cover band who did weddings and just generally kicked around the Boston scene. He also landed the Cinemax house-composer job in 1996 and held it for five years. As he explains, you get paid every time your music is played on one of the cable network’s many channels. The money paid for the Dorchester house he now shares with his wife.

And there was Combustible Edison, the hip lounge band formed by Michael Cudahy and Liz Cox. “I had gotten into easy listening in the late ’80s and had been a big soundtrack collector. I started seeing Combustible, and my line at the time was I thought they’d broken into my house, stolen all my records, and were playing them back to me. One day Michael called me and said, ‘I have a proposition for you.’ I went out with Combustible and it was a hit, a big hit, more so than any of us would have predicted.”

Indeed, his role in Combustible led to his working with Mexican lounge king Esquivel. And he consulted on Capitol Records’ Ultra Lounge series. And being in Dragonfly has already given him some new ideas, like moving to India to work on Bollywood soundtracks. “The culture, it’s amazing. The place is completely chaotic, yet it doesn’t collapse. There’s a vibrancy to the culture I find very appealing.”

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