Badfinger Totally Explained

Everything about Badfinger totally explained

Badfinger were a rock band formed in Swansea, Wales in the early 1960s and were one of the earliest representatives of the power pop genre. During the early 1970s the band were touted as the heir apparent to The Beatles, partly because of their close working relationship with the 'Fab Four' and partly because of their similar sound. However, Badfinger fell victim to some of the worst elements of the music industry, resulting in its two principal singers and songwriters committing suicide in 1975 and 1983.

Biography

The Iveys

Badfinger originated with Pete Ham (lead guitar/keyboards), Ron Griffiths (bass guitar) and David 'Dai' Jenkins (guitar), who formed The Iveys, named after a street in Swansea, Wales, in 1964. By March of 1965, Mike Gibbins had joined as the drummer and the band began playing locally with such national groups as the Spencer Davis Group, The Who, The Moody Blues and The Yardbirds. By March 1966, the band had retained a personal manager named Bill Collins and moved their base to London, performing both as a backing band for David Garrick (a local singer) and as a solo act. The following year, Jenkins was asked to leave the group and was replaced by Liverpudlian rhythm guitarist Tom Evans.
   A well-received stage act on the London circuit, performing a wide range of covers from Motown artists to The Beatles, The Iveys garnered interest from several record labels. However, it wasn't until Mal Evans, the longtime "roadie" for The Beatles and an employee of their Apple label, took up their cause that they were signed with Apple in 1968. Mal Evans took several demo tapes of the group to each of the individual Beatles and finally got approval for signing them from Paul McCartney, George Harrison and John Lennon. At this low ebb, McCartney gave The Iveys a boost when he offered them the chance to record and release "Come And Get It," a song he'd written for the soundtrack of the film The Magic Christian, which starred Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr. McCartney went on to produce the song for the band, as well as the group's original compositions of "Carry On Till Tomorrow" (commissioned as the main title theme) and "Rock Of All Ages". These three tracks would appear both in the film and on the soundtrack album. Because Ron Griffiths fell ill midway during the sessions, Tom Evans had to double on bass on some tracks. After much internal debate at Apple, the group changed their name to Badfinger, which was suggested by Apple's Neil Aspinall. Other suggestions included: The Glass Onion, The Prix, and The Cagneys from John Lennon, and Home from Paul McCartney.
   The name Badfinger was a reference to "Bad Finger Boogie", an early working title of Lennon's "With a Little Help from My Friends", so called because Lennon had composed the melody on a piano using his middle finger after having hurt his forefinger. "Come and Get It" was chosen to debut the new Badfinger name.
   After unsuccessfully auditioning numerous bass guitarists, and with the release date of "Come and Get It" fast approaching, Badfinger hired Liverpudlian lead guitarist Joey Molland. The addition of Molland required Evans to shift permanently to bass, something Evans was willing to do for the sake of expediency.
   "Come and Get It" was released in December 1969 in the U.K. and January 1970 in the U.S. It was successful throughout Europe, where it duplicated The Iveys' success, and also in the United Kingdom and the United States, where it reached the Billboard Top 10. The track also accompanied the opening scenes of The Magic Christian film. Media comparisons between Badfinger and The Beatles would continue throughout Badfinger's career.
   During this time, Badfinger also recorded many sessions for fellow Apple Records labelmates, notably playing acoustic guitar on tracks from George Harrison's "All Things Must Pass" and providing backing vocals on Ringo Starr's single "It Don't Come Easy." Evans and Molland performed on John Lennon's album Imagine, and all four members of the band appeared as backup musicians throughout George Harrison's Concert for Bangladesh in August 1971, with Ham soloing on "Here Comes the Sun".
   Internal friction centering on band management, money, and group leadership had been growing within Badfinger during the Polley years, as the band's success wasn't matched by its revenues. By 1974, Joey Molland's wife, Kathie, began taking a more assertive role in the band's politics, which didn't endear her to Molland's bandmates, particularly Ham. Just before the band began rehearsals for an October 1974 U.K. tour, Ham suddenly quit the band during a management meeting, stating that he didn't want to belong to a band managed by Kathie Molland., and rough mixes were distributed to the musicians and to Warner Brothers in America. Before the album was formally submitted to Warners, though, Warners Publishing filed a lawsuit against Stan Polley and Badfinger on December 10, 1974 in L.A. Superior Court. Polley then allegedly submitted the Head First tapes to Warners in an attempt to secure one more album advance prior to the litigation, but Warner Publishing quickly rejected the tapes, and Warner Brothers refused to pay the bonus. The legal action soon forced Warners to stop the promotion and then withdraw distribution of Wish You Were Here worldwide, thus halting Badfinger's career. Molland also has been criticized for his 1995 re-recording of Badfinger's hit songs for a CD release. The recordings have since been distributed with packaging and photos displaying the original 1970s version of the group, although Molland is the only member of Badfinger from that time who appears on the recordings.
   In 1988, Straight Up ranked as the most-requested CD release among out-of-print albums in a readers poll for Goldmine magazine; it finally made it to CD in 1993. Bob Jackson, meanwhile, managed to get the "rough mix" version of Head First (that had been prepared by Apple engineer Phil McDonald in December 1974) released on CD in 2000, after Warner Brothers refused to make the original master tapes available for remixing. In 2002, Mike Gibbins released a two-disk set of a Badfinger performance in Indiana made on a consumer cassette recorder, entitled Live 83 -- DBA-BFR, recorded on October 19, 1982. The band at that time consisted of Evans, Gibbins, Jackson, Reed Kailing and Donnie Dacus. However, the poor quality of the recording, which is closer to a bootleg recording than an official release, mars the performance.
   A detailed biography on Badfinger written by Dan Matovina came out in 1997 entitled Without You: The Tragic Story Of Badfinger, and a 2nd revised edition of the book came out in 2000.
   Two separate CDs of Apple Publishing music, entitled 94 Baker Street and An Apple A Day on Cherry Red Records, were released in 2003 and 2006 repsectively. These CDs contain nine songs by The Iveys, including a demo version of "Maybe Tomorrow" and eight previously-unreleased Iveys performances of songs wriiten by Tom Evans, Pete Ham or Ron Griffiths.

Post-Badfinger solo activities

Joey Molland still performs in the United States as Badfinger or Joey Molland's Badfinger and has released three solo albums, After The Pearl (1985), The Pilgrim (1992) and This Way Up (2001). He also privately released a CD collection of demos called Basil (1998).
   In 1997 and 1999, posthumous collections of Pete Ham home recordings and demos were released on two separate CDs, 7 Park Avenue and Golders Green. Ham's final compositions, such as "Ringside" and "No More," reflected his depression over the financial and management situations that he faced.
   One posthumous Tom Evans CD was released in 1995, Over You: The Final Tracks which was produced by friend and post-Badfinger songwriting partner, Rod Roach.
   Mike Gibbins released his first solo album on Forbidden Records in 1997, called A Place In Time. Between 2000-2003, he released 3 more solo albums on CD (More Annoying Songs, Archeology, and In The Meantime) on his own private label, Exile Music, with the first, A Place In Time being remastered and reconfigured for re-release in 2001. Gibbins died in his sleep at his home in Oviedo, Florida on October 4, 2005. He was 56.
   In 1995, Bob Jackson joined The Fortunes, a 1960s English group still playing on the nostalgia circuit. He is currently working on his first solo album, and is still touring in the U.K. with The Fortunes.
   A Badfinger convention in Swansea, Wales held in May 2006 brought together Jackson, Griffiths, and several surviving members of the Ham, Evans and Gibbins families.

Personnel

Membership of The Iveys/Badfinger underwent numerous personnel changes and, at the end, none of the original members of The Iveys were still in Badfinger. Members of Badfinger's classic 1969 - 1974 lineup are in bold.

The Iveys 1965 - 1967	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Ron Griffiths - vocals, bass David "Dai" Jenkins - vocals, guitar Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
The Iveys 1967 - 1969	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Tom Evans - vocals, guitar, bass Ron Griffiths - vocals, bass Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
Badfinger 1969	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Tom Evans - vocals, guitar, bass Ron Griffiths - vocals, bass Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
Badfinger 1969 - 1974	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Joey Molland - vocals, guitar, piano Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
Badfinger 1974	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Joey Molland - vocals, guitar, piano Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
Badfinger 1974 - 1975	Pete Ham - vocals, guitar, keyboards Tom Evans - vocals, bass Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards, guitar Mike Gibbins - vocals, drums, percussion
1975 - 1978	*Band Split*
Badfinger 1978 - 1979	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Joey Molland - vocals, guitar, piano Joe Tansin - vocals, guitar Kenny Harck - drums
Badfinger 1979 - 1980	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Joey Molland - vocals, guitar, piano Tony Kaye - keyboards Peter Clarke - drums
Badfinger 1980 - 1982	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Joey Molland - vocals, guitar, piano Glen Sherba - guitar Tony Kaye - keyboards Richard Bryans - drums
Badfinger 1982	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Adam Allen - guitar Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards, guitar Mike Gibbins - drums
Badfinger 1982	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Reed Kailing - vocals, guitar Donnie Dacus - guitar Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards, guitar Mike Gibbins - drums
Badfinger 1982 - 1983	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Al Wodtke - guitar Greg Gehring - guitar Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards, guitar Dan Grenier - drums
Badfinger 1983	Tom Evans - vocals, bass, guitar Glen Sherba - guitar Tony Kaye - keyboards Bob Jackson - vocals, keyboards, guitar Lenny Campanero - drums

Discography

Original albums

Year of Release	Title	Singles (Billboard/Cashbox ranking) [MelodyMaker]
1969	Maybe Tomorrow (as "The Iveys")	"Maybe Tomorrow" #67
1970	Magic Christian Music #55	"Come and Get It" #7/#6 [#4]
1970	No Dice #28	"No Matter What" #8/#3 [#5]
1971	Straight Up #31	"Day After Day," #4/#3 [#10]"Baby Blue" #14/#10
1973	Ass #122	"Apple of My Eye" #102
1974	Badfinger #161	"Love Is Easy" (no charting)"I Miss You" (no charting)
1974	Wish You Were Here #148
1979	Airwaves #125	"Lost Inside Your Love" (no charting)"Love Is Gonna Come At Last" #69
1981	Say No More #155	"Hold On" #56
1990
1997	BBC In Concert 1972-1973
2000	Head First
2002	Live 83 -- DBA-BFR

Compilations

Year of Release	Title
1989	Shine On (UK only)
1990	The Best of Badfinger, Vol. 2
1995	The Best Of Badfinger
2000	The Very Best Of Badfinger

Further Information

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