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Badfinger: Rock's Unluckiest Band Meets Shock Theater · Jon's WTF Music Moments

• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Welcome to John's WTF Music Moments, the podcast where music
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: history gets so weird that you stop and think, wait,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: did this really happen? And it did. Oh, it did.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: So imagine for a moment you're a member of a
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: rock band that just a decade earlier was hailed as
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: the next Beatles. You've recorded hit songs. You've worked with
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: members of the Beatles. Paul McCartney himself has written and
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: produced a song for you George Harrison has helped produce
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: your records. You've got the talent, the songs, the connection.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: And now it's 1982. You're stranded in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Your
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: finance is a disaster. Your career in the toilet. And
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: you're performing on a low-budget local television show called Shock Theater.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: And the host of that show? A horror show character
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: named Toulouse No-Neck. The song? Your old hit, Come and
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Get It. The special effects, dancing girls, a horror movie
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  Speaker 1: host joining the performance, and a rubber chicken hanging from
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  Speaker 1: your microphone stand, just because, why not? And the guy
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  Speaker 1: singing lead vocals, a fellow by the name of Tom Evans,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: a man who helped write one of the most successful
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: love songs of all time, and who, in a little
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  Speaker 1: over a year, would be dead. Today, we are talking
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: about Badfinger. a band with the talent to become one
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  Speaker 1: of the biggest acts of the 1970s, a manager who
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  Speaker 1: helped turn their success into a financial nightmare, and one
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: of the most surreal television appearances in rock history. This
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  Speaker 1: is the story of Badfinger on Shock Theater. And trust me,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: the rubber chicken, folks, is the least disturbing part. Let's
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: start with the important question. Who were Badfinger? And why
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: should we care about a television appearance from 1982? Well,
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: for a brief period, Badfinger were positioned to become one
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: of the major British rock bands of their generation. So
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: the group began in Wales in the 1960s under the
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: name The Ivies, and eventually they became Badfinger and signed
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: to Apple Records, the record label established by The Beatles.
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  Speaker 1: And that was one hell of a foot in the door.
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  Speaker 1: Their connection to the Beatles went beyond a record company logo.
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  Speaker 1: Paul McCartney wrote and produced Come and Get It for
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: them in 1969. The song becomes a hit in 1970.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: It reaches the U.S. top 10. So listen to the song.
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  Speaker 1: It's catchy, polished, melodic, and unmistakably in the Beatles' musical neighborhood.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds like the kind of record that could have
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: been a Beatles single. And then, There was no matter what,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: day after day, Baby Blue. Amazing songs. Baby Blue is
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: particularly gorgeous. It's one of those songs that sounds instantly familiar,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: even if you can't quite remember where you heard it.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: Decades later, its appearance in the finale of Breaking Bad
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: introduced it to a whole new generation. And Badfinger weren't
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: simply copying the Beatles either. They were helping establish the melodic,
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: guitar-driven sound that it would eventually become known as Power Pop.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: George Harrison co-produced some of their music, and members of
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Badfinger participated in Harrison's All Things Must Pass sessions and
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: his concert for Bangladesh. And then there's Without You. Yes,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Pete Hamm of Badfinger and Tom Evans of Badfinger wrote
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  Speaker 1: that song together. It was an ode to Ham's Girlfriend.
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  Speaker 1: The band recorded it, but their version wasn't the one
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  Speaker 1: that became a worldwide sensation. Oh, no. Harry Nilsson covered
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: it in 1971, and his recording reached number one in
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  Speaker 1: the United States in 1972. You know the song. You
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: know the chorus. You know that soaring vocal. I can't
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: leave if living is without you. And you may also
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: know that Mariah Carey's later version from the 1990s was
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: a huge hit. But let's not talk about that. Let's
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: talk about Hamm and Evans, two members of Badfinger who
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: wrote the song, who wrote the majority of Badfinger's incredible
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: songs on their first few albums, and both of whom
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: would eventually die by suicide within a decade of one another.
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  Speaker 1: Let that sink in. But before we get to all that,
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: we need to talk about a man named Stan Pauly.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: Because if you want to understand how a band with
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: this much going for it ended up performing on a
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  Speaker 1: Milwaukee horror movie show, well, you need to understand what
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: happened to the band's money. So Stan Pauly, he was
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: an American entertainment manager who came into Bad Fingers' world
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  Speaker 1: around 1970. He had other music industry clients and presented
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  Speaker 1: himself as a well-connected businessman who could manage the group's finances,
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  Speaker 1: and help advance its career. The band had every reason
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  Speaker 1: to believe that getting a professional manager was the right move.
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  Speaker 1: They were young musicians who suddenly found themselves working with
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  Speaker 1: the Beatles record company and touring internationally. They weren't necessarily
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  Speaker 1: equipped to navigate complicated contracts, corporate accounts, publishing arrangements, and
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  Speaker 1: royalty statements. Pauly took complete control of the business side, oil.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: And that's where things went horribly wrong. Through companies he
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: established to handle Badfinger's affairs, income from touring, recordings, publishing,
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  Speaker 1: and songwriting royalties were all directed into accounts and arrangements
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  Speaker 1: that Pauly controlled. The musicians received salaries and advances rather
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: than having straightforward access to all the money their work
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: was generating. Here's where it gets outrageous. Badfinger were making
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  Speaker 1: records that sold around the world. They were touring constantly.
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  Speaker 1: Their songs were on the radio. They were working with
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  Speaker 1: some of the biggest names in music. Yet the band
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: members repeatedly found themselves short of money, broke even. Guitarist
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: Joey Mullen later recalled that the group was playing roughly
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: 120 shows a year, with records being played around the world,
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  Speaker 1: but the musicians weren't seeing the earnings they expected. They
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: couldn't even afford ordinary things. The financial records tell a
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  Speaker 1: remarkable story. One accounting statement covering part of 1970 and
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: 1971 listed Polly's management commission at $ 75, 744. That's a lot
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  Speaker 1: of money in 1970, 1971 for just one of many
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  Speaker 1: groups that you're managing. the individual band members' salaries and
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: advances listed on that same statement were all below $ 9, 000. Now,
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: management commissions and salaries don't tell us everything about the
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: band's finances, but it gives you a sense of the
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: imbalance that would become a central issue later on. The
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  Speaker 1: people making the music were struggling to get by while
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: the man controlling the business was receiving substantial sums. And
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: it got worse. So when Badfinger moved from Apple to
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: Warner Brothers Records, the financial arrangements became even more complicated.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: Warner Brothers advanced money connected to the band's recording deal,
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  Speaker 1: but funds intended to support the group's business became entangled
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  Speaker 1: in accounts controlled by Pauly. Warner's publishing division subsequently pursued
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: missing money and legal action followed. The dispute interfered with
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  Speaker 1: the band's ability to collect earnings and and to continue
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: releasing music. Their album, Wish You Were Here, was caught
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  Speaker 1: up in the resulting mess, and their next album, Head First,
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  Speaker 1: was shelved. By 1974, members of the band were becoming
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  Speaker 1: increasingly suspicious of Pauly. Joey Mullen wanted out. Other members
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  Speaker 1: were divided over whether to keep trusting the manager. Pete Hamm,
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  Speaker 1: in particular, had faith in Pauly and struggled to accept
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  Speaker 1: that the man who'd supposedly been looking after the band's interests,
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  Speaker 1: might have betrayed them. The disagreements caused fractures within the group.
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  Speaker 1: Mullen eventually left. And what happened to him next is
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: worth remembering because it shows how far the band's fortunes
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  Speaker 1: had fallen. So Joey Mullen's the band's guitarist during their
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  Speaker 1: most popular stretch. He'd helped make those records. He toured internationally.
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  Speaker 1: He'd played alongside members of the Beatles. And then, After
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: leaving Badfinger, he ends up in the mid-1970s in Los
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Angeles with very little money. Molland later would describe having
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: to take whatever work he could find to support his family.
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  Speaker 1: He worked as a carpenter and later installing carpets. Now
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: think about that. This is not a knock on people
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  Speaker 1: who work as carpenters or carpet installers. Those are honest jobs.
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  Speaker 1: And there's nothing wrong with doing whatever it takes to
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  Speaker 1: support your family. The tragedy here is in the contrast,
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  Speaker 1: because here was a musician who had played on hit
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: records and toured the world, now trying to make ends
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  Speaker 1: meet through manual labor because his career had collapsed and
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  Speaker 1: the money he'd expected to earn from music hadn't materialized
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  Speaker 1: as it should have. Mullen wasn't the only member of
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  Speaker 1: Badfinger to experience financial hardship. but his story makes the
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  Speaker 1: situation tangible. These weren't people who'd blown millions on mansions,
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  Speaker 1: sports cars, or extravagant lifestyles. They were musicians who worked hard,
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  Speaker 1: recorded successful songs, and just wanted to be able to
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  Speaker 1: be rock and roll guys and support their families. Now instead,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: they're dealing with the consequences of a business arrangement that
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  Speaker 1: became increasingly difficult and robbed them of the rewards of
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  Speaker 1: their own success. The consequences for Pete Ham were devastating.
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  Speaker 1: By 1975, Pete Ham was under immense professional and financial pressure.
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  Speaker 1: He was also facing personal difficulties. Pete Ham died by
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  Speaker 1: suicide on April 24, 1975, at the age of 27.
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  Speaker 1: His death devastated the surviving members of Badfinger. The band
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  Speaker 1: broke up, and the remaining musicians tried to figure out
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  Speaker 1: how to move forward. Tom Evans wasn't ready to give
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  Speaker 1: up on Badfinger, despite losing Pete Hamm, his friend, his
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  Speaker 1: songwriting partner, and above all else, perhaps, the band's creative visionary.
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  Speaker 1: Over the next few years that followed, different lineups attempted
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  Speaker 1: to revive the band. Musicians came and went. Yes, there
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  Speaker 1: were recordings and tours, but none of them seemed to
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  Speaker 1: gain momentum. By 1982, Evans and drummer Mike Gibbons were
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  Speaker 1: involved in another attempt to get Badfinger back on the road,
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  Speaker 1: this time with Bob Jackson among the musicians helping to
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  Speaker 1: keep the music alive. And this is how we arrive
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  Speaker 1: in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Enter John Cass, a Milwaukee businessman and
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  Speaker 1: Badfinger fan who offered the prospect of a comeback. Cass
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  Speaker 1: promised work, gigs, and a way to get the band
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  Speaker 1: moving again. For musicians who'd been through years of financial uncertainty,
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  Speaker 1: This must have sounded appealing. Jackson was skeptical, but he
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  Speaker 1: agreed to come over from England because he believed in
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  Speaker 1: Tom and wanted to help Badfinger get moving again. The
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  Speaker 1: plan quickly began to unravel. Contracts were complicated. The promised
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: gigs weren't materializing as expected. The band was housed in
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: an almost empty model home somewhere in the middle of
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  Speaker 1: nowhere in Wisconsin with inadequate sleeping arrangements for the musicians
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  Speaker 1: and the crew. Imagine leaving your family in England because
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  Speaker 1: you've been promised work in a once famous band, only
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  Speaker 1: to end up in a barely furnished house in the
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: American Midwest. That was the situation Jackson described. As the
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: weeks went on, the circumstances became even worse. Accounts of
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: this Milwaukee period described disputes over contracts, pressure on the musicians,
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  Speaker 1: Concern about their ability to leave the arrangement. The band
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: played small clubs and poorly organized gigs. Money was scarce.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: The accommodations, miserable. Here's the thing. People who saw Badfinger
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  Speaker 1: play during this period often said the band was still
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  Speaker 1: very good. They could still perform. They could still deliver
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: the songs. The talent hadn't vanished. They were simply being
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: put in an increasingly desperate set of circumstances. And then
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: comes the television booking. It's important to note that Shock
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Theater wasn't the Tonight Show. It wasn't American Bandstand. It
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: wasn't MTV, which was brand new at the time. Shock
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: Theater wasn't some national television program that a major rock
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: act could expect to reach millions of viewers. This was
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: a long-running, low-budget, local horror and science fiction movie show
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: on Milwaukee television station WISN-TV Channel 12. The host, Toulouse Nonet,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: a character played by WISN staffer Rick Felski. This was
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: a great tradition of local television hosts back then. You know,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: there's a character introducing old movies, cracking bad jokes, and
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: entertaining a regional audience with a deliberately oddball persona. The
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  Speaker 1: show had its own local personality, its own low-budget charm.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: It was the sort of program that could fill an
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: afternoon with an old science fiction movie and host who
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: looked as if he'd wandered out of a monster makeup room.
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  Speaker 1: So on the day Badfinger appears in 1982, the feature
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: film was Journey to the Center of Time, a 1967
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: science fiction movie. And somehow, This was the setting in
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: which a band once hailed as the successors to the
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: Beatles found itself performing. The band apparently wasn't properly prepared
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: for what awaited them. Bob Jackson later recalled that the
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: musicians didn't understand the show's tone until they saw the
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: host in full makeup. They didn't know Toulouse-Nonak was going
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: to actually join them on stage. They didn't know there
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: would be dancing girls. And they certainly weren't expecting the
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: entire thing to become one of the strangest and perhaps
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: even saddest footnotes in the history of a once promising
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: rock band. Here's Badfinger in Milwaukee in 1982. The band
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: is in trouble. They're struggling financially. They're trying to stay alive.
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  Speaker 1: They're on the soundstage of Shock Theater. The cameras are rolling.
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: They're about to play Come and Get It. And there's
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  Speaker 1: Tom Evans. singing that song that Paul McCartney wrote and
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: produced for Badfinger just a little over a decade earlier.
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: There's Bob Jackson, there's Mike Gibbons, and the rest of
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: the musicians doing their best to get through the performance.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: And then there's Toulouse No-Neck. Picture the host in full
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: horror show makeup, a character designed to introduce monster movies
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: and entertain local viewers. This is not a conventional rock
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: show host in a smart suit waiting politely for the
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: song to finish before asking about the album. Oh, no.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: No-neck decides to get involved. According to Jackson's recollection, the
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: host joins the performance, singing along with the band. Not
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: some planned duet with Paul McCartney. Not a surprise performance
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: appearance by a fellow rock star. No. To lose No-neck.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: And the performance features dancing girls because apparently the situation
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: wasn't bizarre enough already. Oh yeah, don't forget about the
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: rubber chicken attached to Tom Evans' microphone stand. Yes, a
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: rubber chicken. Now, I'm not sure what the ideal stage
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: decoration is when you're trying to preserve the dignity of
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: a once-celebrated British power pop group. But I'm going to
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: guess that a rubber chicken probably wouldn't be the first choice.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: You're hearing those familiar opening chords of Come and Get It.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: It's a beautifully constructed pop song with that unmistakable McCartney touch.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: But then the band is presented as the next great
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: British rock act. Right after that, that track is released.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: You're watching them now, over a decade later, on a
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: low-budget horror movie show. The whole thing has the quality
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: of a dream that turns into a nightmare halfway through it.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: And the most uncomfortable part is that the band apparently
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: didn't know what they were walking into. Jackson later said
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: they were taken aback by the show's tone and by
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  Speaker 1: the host's decision to join in. This wasn't simply a
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: band choosing to do something deliberately silly for a laugh.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: It was a group of musicians who had come to
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: Milwaukee hoping to revive their fortunes and found themselves in
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: circumstances They hadn't anticipated. The rubber chicken is funny. The
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: dancing girls are absurd. To lose no neck, singing along
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: is the sort of thing that makes you wonder if
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: someone got dosed with acid or something. But when you
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: understand the background, the humor gets darker. These were men
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: who had experienced a devastating loss. They were desperate. They
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: were dealing with financial uncertainties. questionable contracts, and a career
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: that had fallen a long way from its early promise.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: And now they were performing on a local horror show
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: while trying to figure out how to get their lives
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: and careers back on track. The footage, and you can
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: watch it on YouTube, might be funny in isolation. The
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: circumstances make it heartbreaking. After Shock Theater, Evans and Jackson
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: fled Milwaukee. In fact, Jackson died would later describe the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: experience as something like a bad movie called Escape from Milwaukee.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: But getting out of Wisconsin didn't mean getting out of trouble.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: The legal disputes continued. Band was sued by members of
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: the group, rather, was sued over their contracts and financial
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: pressures followed Evans back to England. There was another particularly
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: damaging consequence. Evans had signed away certain publishing and royalty
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: rights connected to the arrangement. That arrangement would continue to
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: haunt him. The irony here is brutal. Badfinger's earlier financial
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: problems had already helped destroy the band's original lineup. Now,
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: years later, Evans was once again entangled in an arrangement
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: that threatened his financial future. He had tried to resurrect
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: the band and ended up facing another nightmare. On November 19, 1983,
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: Tom Evans died by suicide at the age of 36.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: His death came roughly 16 months after the summer of
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: 1982 shock theater appearance. Circumstances regarding Evans' death Final months
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: included continuing legal and financial disputes, unresolved battle over money
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: connected to Badfinger's early recordings, and much more. It's clear
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: that Evans had been under enormous pressure. And that brings
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: us to Without You. Think about the history of that song.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Pete Hamm and Tom Evans wrote it together. Harry Nilsson
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: turned it into a massive hit. Mariah Carey later recorded
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: her own successful version of it. It became one of
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: the great dramatic ballads of popular music. It's a song
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: about losing someone, about the impossibility of imagining life without
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: the person you love. And both of the men who
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: wrote it died by suicide, not quite a decade apart,
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: after enduring devastating personal and professional struggles. There's no moral
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: to that story. No clever punchline. No way to make
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: it all add up. What we can say is that
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: the music survived. The songs continued to find listeners. Baby
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Blue found a new audience through Breaking Bad. Without You
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  Speaker 1: kept being recorded by artists across generations. Day after day
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: with that slide guitar remains a power pop ballad classic.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: Bad Fingers' best work was an influence on musicians who
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: valued melody, harmony, and beautifully crafted pop songs. The band
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: was more than its tragedy. Pete Hamm and Tom Evans
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: were more than the circumstances of their deaths. They were
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: talented songwriters who created music that people still love, and
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: that's worth remembering. So now, four decades later, more than
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: four decades later, what do we make of shock theater? Well,
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: on one level, It's one of the most bizarre rock
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: TV moments you could hope to find. A band once
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: linked to the Beatles performing its old hit on a
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: low-budget Milwaukee horror show while Toulouse No-Neck joins in and
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: a rubber chicken hangs from the microphone stand. It's absurd.
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: It's surreal. It's the kind of thing that makes you
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: wonder how a documentary filmmaker could possibly have invented a
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: better scene. But the real story isn't that Badfinger had
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: become a joke. The real story is that a group
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: of talented musicians found themselves trapped in a series of
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: increasingly desperate circumstances, trying to keep a career alive after
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: years of financial and personal devastation. They could still play.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: They could still sing. The songs were still there. What
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: they couldn't seem to escape was everything happening around them.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: Pete Hamm was gone. Tom Evans was still trying to
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: carry on. and in a little more than a year,
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: he'd be gone too. So the next time you hear
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: Come and Get It, remember the song's extraordinary journey from
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: Paul McCartney's studio to the charts, from the promise of
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: Badfinger's early success to a Milwaukee soundstage where a horror
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: show host joined the performance. And don't forget about Joey Mullin,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: a guitarist who helped make those records. and then ended
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: up having to install carpets a couple years later to
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: support his family. Pete Hamm took his own life in
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: the 1970s, Tom Evans in the 1980s. In 2006, drummer
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: Mike Gibbons would pass away, and finally Joey Mullen passed
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: away just a couple of years ago. All four original
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: members of Badfinger are now gone. The story of Badfinger
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: isn't just about what was lost. It's about the music
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: that survived, and the musicians who tried their best to
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: carry it forward. A great band, a terrible business story,
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: a local horror host named Toulouse Snowneck, and one very
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: unfortunate rubber chicken. I'm John, and this has been John's
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: WTF Music Moments.