Badfinger- Straight Up- the late Joey Molland & Mike Gibbins

( L-R Joey Molland, Tom Evans, Pete Ham, Mike Gibbins)

It was during the same period, which millions have now witnessed in Peter Jackson’s documentary Get Back over fifty years ago, that US audiences were introduced through a Paul McCartney song,”Come and Get It”, to a little-known English band The Iveys. Soon they were rechristened Badfinger and became second only to The Beatles in sales on the Apple Records label, as “Come and Get It” by Badfinger reached #4 in the UK, #7 in the States. So with that kind of Top Ten start on both sides of the Atlantic, what could have possibly gone wrong? As you will hear, everything.

If the Big Star story warrants box sets and  a documentary film, then the saga of Badfinger surely deserves a full-blown mini-series. Maybe the appearance of Badfinger’s hit “Baby Blue” in the finale of the hit cable series Breaking Bad, originally from the brilliant December 1971 Straight Up  album, generated enough buzz to get their tragicomic story into development. Certainly every element necessary is there in spades: working-class struggle; anointing by rock royalty the Beatles; hit songs “Come and Get It”( donated by Paul McCartney ), “No Matter What”,” Day After Day”,”Just a Chance”; intrigue, big money, even bigger crooks, pathos, and heartbreaking suicides. Yeah, plural. Guitarist/singer/songwriter Joey Molland, who was the last man standing until March 2025, and Badfinger drummer the late Mike Gibbins tell the dashed dreams of the ill-fated quartet in my rare classic rock interview to mark the anniversary of Straight Up, produced by Beatle George Harrison until he was called away by Ravi Shankar to organize a star-studded benefit concert for monsoon-ravaged Bangla Desh. Substituted for George Harrison as Badfinger Straight Up producer? Some American kid in his early twenties named Todd Rundgren. – Redbeard