Coming on March 26th is Badfinger's No Matter What – Revisiting The Hits collection, according to Loudersound. The project, which is spearheaded by sole-surviving member Joey Molland, features contributions from such heavyweights as the band's former producer Todd Rundgren, Rick Springfield, Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson, Yes' Rick Wakeman, Matthew Sweet, Vanilla Fudge frontman Mark Stein, Terry Reid, and Albert Lee, among others.
Rick Springfield said of his participation on the set, “Badfinger have always been one of my all-time favorite bands. In fact, I am often asked by journalists, 'What is the one song you had wished you had written?' and my answer is (Pete Ham's) 'Baby Blue.' What a perfect song! Their music was and is immortal.”
Although many groups in the late-'60s and early-'70s preached peace, togetherness, and brotherhood, guitarist Joey Molland says that he, Pete Ham, Tommy Evans, and Mike Gibbins were literally a living and breathing example of a type of “Rock Socialism”: “We were tied together, yeah, by those agreements, by that band feeling — we did share everything. And everything and anything to do with the band was owned by everybody in the band. Badfinger was like some kind of throwback or something, I don't know. It was like we all formed a band when we were in school, or something. And we hung out together, we lived together — we did everything together, went to shows. We didn't sit in each other's lap, or anything like that, but we slept on each other's couches (laughs) that's for sure.”
Joey Molland, who played lead guitar on “Baby Blue,” told us that unlike other bands who have four very strong writers within the group, he and Pete Ham — the two dominant forces in Badfinger — meshed well, both with their material and their signature power pop guitar sound: “Pete and I both liked to play lead. And what would happened would normally happen, if Pete had a song, then I would normally play lead on it — like, I play lead on 'No Matter What'; 'Better Days' — Pete played the lead on that. And we worked together very well, there was no kind of conflict between us. He liked the way I played, I like the way he played and we were completely different kinds of players.”
The tracklisting to 'Matter What – Revisiting The Hits' is:
“No Matter What” – with Mark Stein of Vanilla Fudge
“Come And Get It” – with Rick Wakeman
“I Don’t Mind” – with Carl Giammarese of The Buckinghams
“Day After Day” – with Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson, Terry Reid & The Manchester String Quartet
“Love Is Gonna Come At Last” – with Rick Springfield
“Baby Blue” – with Matthew Sweet
“Midnight Caller” – with The Legendary Pink Dots
“Suitcase” – with Sonny Landreth
“Sweet Tuesday Morning” – with Albert Lee
“Without You” – with Todd Rundgren
