Badfinger and Beyond [Paperback]

"Wow! A new Badfinger biography", I thought, when I ran across the book titled "Badfinger and Beyond" on Amazon. As a fan of this British group from the 1970's and since the price was affordable, I did not hesitate to order a copy of the book. Upon closer inspection and a peek at the cover, I saw that this was not really a Badfinger biography, but more of a biography of guitarist Joey Molland built around interviews conducted by writer Michael Cimino. I know Joey have been talking about a book for years and here it is!

After reading the book it is apparent this is a Joey Molland interview pretty much from beginning to end. He is the undisputed protagonist and focal point. For fans of Molland this is likely what they are looking for.

Joey tells us some background of Badfinger songs and I enjoyed that, but for fans of the band, I think they may be somewhat disappointed with the small amount of insights Joey offers into other band members songs and their personal sides. It seems he stayed tight to his wife, Kathie, most of the time. She has some interesting things to say in this book, too.

Joey expands on a lot of stories that were in the previous Badfinger biography by Dan Matovina, "Without You: The Tragic Story Of Badfinger". Not many new events come up here. It does shines through that it is critical for him to enumerate the various famous rock personalities he encountered during his career, but a lot of it is stuff such as sitting at the same canteen table or attending their concert and making eye contact. He said the big stars made him nervous and he never really bonded with any of them.

On the business stuff, I wouldn't know what to believe of Joey's stories, because I wasn't there. But some questioning of that is being shown on the webpage "The Badfinger Book" Blog by Bill. He is making claims that this book may have some manipulated questions and answers. I looked into this claim and saw some evidence of that. Cimino's website had been promoting his book by showing page excerpts of some of his questions and answers with Joey. He asks Joey about a previous claim which had been made by a Pete Ham girlfriend that Pete's song "Take It All" was inspired because of Joey teasing Pete that he was lucky that he got picked to perform the "Here Comes The Sun" acoustic duet with the Beatles' George Harrison at the Bangladesh concert.

Now, by all accounts, it seems Pete Ham was a pretty humble man and the lyrics do seem to fit perfectly with his nature and the events there. But Joey denies in his book that he ever teased Pete Ham and makes a big point that they never argued much.

So I did look into the Bill's claim and I did find that old book excerpt showing his question and Joey's answer on that topic. In the new book, Joey's answer is the same, but Cimino has re-written a completely different question to create a different and better context for Joey's answer! Sadly that brings out whether answers in this book were manipulated, too!

Because of this, I have some questioning of the trustworthiness of the book. I wonder was Cimino hired to write this book because Joey knew he would put together this book to make sure it highlights Joey the way he wants people to perceive him?

This book also does cover Joey's pre-Badfinger days and it goes up to Badfinger events through Tom Evans death in 1983. But what about everything in Joey's life later than 1983? Why didn't Joey account for his last 27 years? There's been several solo albums. Why didn't these years get addressed in this ultimate biography of Joey's life?

I'm giving the book two stars instead of the average rating of three I was going to give it because biographies should have the truth at their basis. And with some of the revelations surrounding "Badfinger And Beyond" now, I'm afraid I can't be sure of what to believe.

I love Badfinger; one of my favorite bands of all-time. Another book by Dan Matovina that came out years ago was excellent and seemed to cover the important areas, but I wanted to read what Joey Molland would do officially. I've been waiting a long time for this. I found his book very disjointed and disappointing. It mostly comes off as a whitewash and incredibly self-aggrandizing. Joey constantly tells you how humble he is; what a great guy he is; how talented he is - yet he's only had a couple legit solo albums in the last 35 years. I don't think the music business people think he's that good, or it could be that he's a pain to deal with.

Joey often elevates his own character as being above Pete Ham and Tom Evans. He claims he was the true purist musician of the group who never "tried" to write a hit. Joey whines that the band treated him unfairly on many occasions. He even has instances that infer Tom and Pete could be drunk and unstable; that they should have followed his advice more often. He does acknowledge their talents, but he's quick to point out he was just as good, or better, in many aspects.

The author claimed "over fifteen" interviews were his to make his cobbled book of quotes. The author admits he just "trusted" whatever Joey told him and believed it was "true." No fact-checking. No bibliography or research credit. Some of Joey's accounts in this book conflict with earlier interviews Joey has done. That's troubling. I did discover a few new bits on the music side, though some are very questionable. And I do commend the author for a lot of music coverage, though it is disappointing that Joey has no insights into any of the other members' lyrics at all. He wasn't all that close to the other band members, nor cared to be, apparently. He has takes on some tomfoolery in the band, but this book left me feeling like I could not trust many of his one-sided accounts of the band politics.

Joey's wife, Kathie, is all over this book, popping up with stories, and she is even more pompous. Kathie had often promised big surprises in their upcoming books for over thirty years (I got her newsletters and read their rants online), but there really aren't any revelations I can find? The book covers business and political issues from Joey and Kathie's perspectives, but the claims often come off nonsensical, as Joey bounces from being a "hippie-who-didn't-care" to a "hardline-negotiator-with-sophisticated-business-men" that is especially implausible. Joey has quotes in here clearly re-written, as he is portrayed reciting flowing long lists, dates, money figures, and details in a much-too-coherent manner as matched against his other rock-star-name-dropping babble.

Apparently, Joey was on the phone with Badfinger member, Tom Evans, on Tom's last night alive, before Tom hanged himself in 1983. Joey talks about this situation like he was a calm voice of reason and Tom escalated the phone call over some money issues surrounding past royalties. Yet, Joey's wife, Kathie, paints a totally different picture of the phone call in the Mollands' endorsed documentary, alleging Joey "really let Tom have it," as she described a whole bunch of accusations Joey hurled at Tom. So the Mollands aren't aligned with their stories. Credibility washes away page by page.

Joey wants you to believe he is the greatest guy in the world! In fact, at the end of this book, Joey states he wants to be remembered as "a great human being." Well, Badfinger drummer, Mike Gibbins, who was around for most of Badfinger's past can be heard talking about Joey in a scathing webpage interview conducted by someone named Sean. In one sound clip, Mike talks about Joey and Kathie's upcoming book. Mike says, "... It will probably go something like this: Joey Molland founded Badfinger and wrote all the hit songs and they co-wrote "Without You" between them, and everybody else is a piece of s***. That's probably how their book will go."

Pretty harsh, pretty comedic... but you know what? Maybe Mike wasn't that far off!

This reads like three different books. The first is about a bunch of musicians no one has ever heard of, the second is about Badfinger, the third is about how some Badfinger songs were written and recorded. I like Joey Molland's contributions to Badfinger but he's not the storyteller he thinks he is. I wasn't impressed at all.