Badfinger - Wish You Were Here

This is more like it.  The last time I wrote about a Badfinger album, I slammed their 1973 album, Ass.  I said then that only four of that album’s ten songs were really worth a damn.    But Wish You Were Here [1974] is a very good piece of work.  Pete Ham awakened from the slumber that seemed to grip him during the making of Ass.  Every song of his on this album is a winner.  Joey Molland contributed more good songs than not for this album.  Even drummer Mike Gibbins gets in on the act.  With Your So Fine and his contribution to In the Meantime/Some Other Time, he atones for the lamentable Cowboy from Ass.  Tom Evans contributes only one song, the merits of which are debatable.  He’s done better. Maybe it was his turn to slumber.  

Keepers

Just a Chance [Ham] – This one storms right out the gate and sets an energetic tone for the rest of the album. It’s unusually fast-paced for a Pete Ham song, but it doesn’t sound rushed and it works.

You’re So Fine [Gibbin] – Very tasty guitar playing here from Pete Ham and Joey Molland.  

Got to Get Out of Here [Molland] – It’s not a dull love song.  It has just an acoustic guitar and an organ, with some tambourine percussion.  This is a bit of foreshadowing as Molland left Badfinger after Wish You Were Here’s release.  

Know One Knows [Ham] – A bad pun in the title, but excellent power pop from Pete Ham.  There’s an interlude where some Japanese woman is mumbling something that gives the song a bit of a twist, but the moment passes quickly enough.  

Dennis [Ham] – For me, it’s a toss-up whether this one or Just a Chance is the best song on the album.  It’s a piano-driven song with great sounding soaring guitars in the mix.  For Badfinger, this is perfection.  

In the Meantime/Some Other Time [Gibbins/Molland] – This one is a piano/guitar driven number with an orchestra.  As I said earlier, when Joey Molland writes a good song, it’s very good.  This one follows that rule.  This one has “Electric Light Orchestra” written all over it.  Here, this is a good thing.   

Meanwhile Back At The Ranch/Should I Smoke [Ham/Molland] – A good album closer.  This is really two songs [one each from Pete Ham and Joey Molland] spliced together to make a single song, not unlike some of the medley songs from Abbey Road.  This ends WYWH with a bang.  

Skip tracks

Love Time [Molland] – another love song from Joey Molland.  I’m glad he loved his wife, but his songs about her/to her bore me.  

King of the Load (T) [Evans] – I’m sorry, songs that feature a Fender Rhodes electric piano as the lead instrument scream “lounge music.”  This one is no exception.  A guitar solo from Pete Ham almost saves it, though.  Thankfully, it’s under three minutes.  

Badfinger were never ones to do things the easy way, Wish You Were Here has a sordid back story as did Straight Up and Ass before it.    Wish You Were Here would be the last album released by the Ham/Evans/Molland/Gibbins quartet.  Joey Molland left the band shortly after the album’s release.  The album itself was on sale for only a few weeks before Warner Brothers pulled it off the shelves.  They made this move because Badfinger’s manager Stan Polley embezzled all of the advance money provided to the band when they signed with the label.  Wish You Were Here just disappeared.  Only in the last few years has it been available for purchase {I got my copy about three years ago].  The band didn’t see a penny of Warner Brothers’ advance.  Quickly after Wish You Were Here’s release, the remaining members of the band recorded Head First. Warner Brothers refused to release it.  The band lost all contact with their manager.  With no money to pay for his new house and no way for him to release his music to the public in order to make money, Pete Ham saw no way out of his situation and committed suicide on April 24, 1975, just a couple of days short of his 28^th birthday.  He left a suicide note that read “I will not be allowed to love and trust everybody. This is better.  P.S. Stan Polley is a soulless bastard. I will take him with me.”  Stan Polley is now dead.  I hope he rots in Hell.

 

Badfinger - Ass

Here’s how to look at Badfinger’s music.  Pete Ham was the most prolific songwriter of the bunch.  Maybe because he had more practice at that particular craft, his songs are usually the strongest the group had to offer.  Bassist Tom Evans wasn’t nearly as prolific and usually got two songs per album.  But his songs were usually pretty good.  The wild card was Joey Molland.  He could write as many songs as Pete Ham, but he was a better guitarist than songwriter.  Molland’s songs were hit or miss.  If they were good, they were really good.  If not, they were extremely ordinary. And so it goes for Badfinger’s 1973 album, Ass.  And herein lies the problem.  

Like its predecessor StraightUp [1971], Badfinger had a hard time getting this album recorded.  Todd Rundgren started producing the album, but got only two songs done before he left the project.  Then the band tried to produce themselves and quickly found themselves in over their heads.  The songs just didn’t sound good.  Finally, Chris Thomas came on board and got it done.  The album sounds great, but production wasn’t the only problem with Ass.  Badfinger was managed by a guy named Stan Polley, whose financial dealings eventually resulted in Pete Ham’s suicide in 1975.  But more to the point, Solley had a different disagreement with Apple.  Three members of Badfinger had a publishing deal with Apple – not so Joey Molland.  Solley tried to block release of the album because of Molland’s publishing.  Ass was delayed for months, but it eventually came out.  When it did come out, Ass was the last album not recorded by an ex-Beatle to get an Apple release.  And by the time it did come out, the band had already jumped to Warner Brothers, so the album got no support from the record company [it came out at the same time as Badfinger’s eponymous debut with Warner Brothers].  And to top off these problems, most of the songs came from Joey Molland.  When your best and most prolific songwriter [Pete Ham] has only two songs on the album [Apple of My Eye and Timeless], you’ve got a problem.  

Keepers - Apple of My Eye was the single from the album, and it details the band’s mixed feelings about leaving Apple for greener pastures at Warner Brothers.  There’s regret at leaving Apple and appreciation for having been given their big break, but they got to the point where they outgrew the label:   

Oh, I'm sorry, but it's time to move away

Though inside my heart, I really want to stay
Believe the love we have is so sincere
You know, the gift you have will always be…  

Oh, I’m sorry, but it’s time to make a stand

Though we never meant to bite the lovin’ hand

And now, the time has come to walk alone

We were the children, now we’re overgrown…

Get Away [Molland].  This is an example of when Joey Molland writes a good song, it’s really good.  This is his commentary on Pete Ham’s work ethic regarding songwriting.  Oddly enough, for this album Pete Ham’s songwriting well was dry.

Timeless [Ham].  This is Pete Ham’s I Want You [She’s So Heavy].  Like that Beatles song, it’s a long one, there is the first half where there is singing, then there’s an extended coda.  Pete Ham solos like a madman over a noisy, fuzzed out climax.  There is 3 seconds difference in the running time.  

Blind Owl [Evans] – This one from Tom Evans has a heavy beginning, but the heaviness doesn’t overstay its welcome.  This one is strong.  

Headscratcher – Constitution [Molland].  This one rocks [or tries to rock] a little too hard for Badfinger.  It’s not bad a bad song, it’s just out of place.  Trying to be Humble Pie was not one of Badfinger’s strengths.

Skip tracks –

I Could Love You [Molland], When I Say [Evans].  Both of these are love songs to the respective songwriters’ wives – yawn. 

Cowboy [Gibbins] – the drummer wrote it.  Extremely forgettable.

Icicles [Molland] – another ballad from Joey Molland.  He shouldn’t do ballads.

The Winner [Molland] – Apparently Joey Molland wrote this about John Lennon.  This one kinda bores me.

Ass is the sound of a band that isn’t sure about the direction of its music.  Are they hard rockers, or are they melodic pop stars?  The band got their musical identity crisis sorted for their Warner Brothers album Wish You Were Here.  It’s a very good album, but that’s for another blog at another time.  Ass has good moments on it.  There just aren’t enough of those good moments to outweigh the mediocre moments.  Perhaps I’m being too harsh on Joey Molland since half the album’s songs are his, but Pete Ham didn’t do the band any favors by coming up with only two songs.

Badfinger - Straight Up

Straight Up is Badfinger's third album for The Beatles' Apple Records. Twelve songs in all, it has 10 good-to-excellent songs and two outstanding songs [Day After Day and Baby Blue, both singles written by Pete Ham]. It has been very hard to find on CD until 2010, when Apple re-released the entire Apple catalog. Included on the new release are six bonus tracks, some of which were recorded with Geoff Emerick producing. The album had been originally recorded between January and March 1971 with Geoff Emerick. George Harrison heard the album and rejected its release, telling them "you can do better." When I hear the Emerick-produced early versions compared with those subsequently produced by either George Harrison or Todd Rundgren, I agree with George's assessment. The songs are good, they don't sound bad at all but Badfinger could do better, and they did.

George produced four songs with the band [Day After Day, I'd Die Babe, Name of the Game, and Suitcase] before he had to back out and tend to making the arrangements for The Concert for Bangladesh. George was so taken with Day After Day that he asked the band if he could play on it. If you're familiar with the song, that's him playing slide guitar with Pete Ham. George heard Name of the Game had potential to be the third single from Straight Up, so he arranged for two remixes to try to get a sound he was looking for. He didn't find the elusive sounds, so Name of the Game was never released as a single. It's still a very good song and remained an album track. Suitcase was written by guitarist Joey Molland about his experiences on the road touring. George Harrison came up with the arrangement. Originally it had the words Pusher pusher, on the run but George said "they won't play it on the radio, so Joey changed Pusher, pusher to Butcher, butcher. George plays guitar on I'd Die Babe. He also helped Joey Molland finish the lyrics [uncredited].

When George Harrison relinquished his production duties, he brought in Todd Rundgren to finish what George had left unfinished. Out of these sessions came Baby Blue, Pete Ham's love letter to someone with whom he had a relationship on tour [his "Dixie dear.."]. Pete Ham and Joey Molland had five songs each on Straight Up, while bassist Tom Evans claimed the other two [he co-wrote on of Joey Molland's songs, Flying]. On their previous two releases [Magic Christian Music and No Dice], Joey Molland wasn't as much of a songwriting presence. But on Straight Up he delivers. Given that Straight Up was rejected once, and had three producers, it's a good sounding record. The songs are all solid, and the band played well. Much has been written about how "Beatlesque" Badfinger's sound was, and that was a double-edged sword for them. They were often derided as second-rate Beatles. They got help first from Paul McCartney, then George Harrison, so how could they help from sounding a little bit like the Fab Four? But taken on it's own merits, Badfinger's sound [tight harmonies, three capable lead singers, loads of guitars, the odd bit of piano, and all four members wrote songs] worked for them. I like their stuff. This is textbook English power pop. If you have the chance, give Straight Up a spin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ8V-FrrGJE
Day After Day

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C53QAuOoSgc
Baby Blue