Musical entities steeped in 1960s musical history will combine in a charity-oriented tribute performance on April 28 with heavy Wisconsin overtones.
The music is that of Badfinger, originally called the Iveys, the British band that holds the distinction of becoming one of the first emerging acts to sign onto Apple Corps, the Beatles’ multimedia company and its Apple Records label, with all its famous and infamous history.
The venue is Let It Be, the downtown Waukesha music club that’s the brainchild and creation of Dave Meister, who twice has reimagined the Cavern Club where the Beatles built their fame in Liverpool in the early 1960s, in a more elegant setting and with a sense of history.
The connection to Wisconsin, beyond the Waukesha venue? That takes some more explaining.
The Milwaukee and Wisconsin Badfinger connections explained
Badfinger – whose best known, hit-making lineup of Pete Ham, Mike Gibbins, Tom Evans and Joey Molland – was quite British. But that changed as the band’s fortunes fell.
Childhood friends Mark Healey and Jeff Alan Ross, both born in Madison, played in a reconstituted Badfinger led by founding member and drummer Gibbins and guitarist Molland in the early 1980s. Healey stayed on with Molland’s Badfinger for 39 years after the band split again, while Ross stayed with Gibbons.
Oh, and for a time in 1982, Badfinger was essentially a Milwaukee band, according to Mark Strothmann, a Milwaukee native and one of the people orchestrating a Badfinger reunion performance at Let It Be featuring Healey and Ross.
“In some respects this started in 1982 when Badfinger found themselves stuck in Milwaukee,” Strothmann said in an email interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “This event will be the opportunity to celebrate that, as well as have Badfinger family together for a wonderful night of celebration.”
Strothmann, a Badfinger fan interested in reviving the band’s Milwaukee connection in a positive light, said a recent connection he made with Brad Smith, a local business leader and musician whose own band had opened for Molland’s Badfinger in June 2021, culminated in the idea of a kind of reunion performance. Not of the original members of Badfinger, who have died, but in those who performed with them later.
“Last year Brad was at a party talking about Badfinger and somebody asked him why he was talking about them and that person said, you need to meet Mark Strothmann,” Strothmann said. “So Brad and I went out for lunch and that lunch led to this.”
In a news release, Strothmann and Smith, brother of Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, said the one-day performance, in part, tries to reclaim Badfinger’s glory regionally as well as historically.
“Although the band’s classic line-up members are no longer with us, there are still living members and a thriving community of closely tied Badfinger and Iveys fans that are thrilled about this event,” the release said. “This event is meant to bring together friends, family and love, for a celebration of the band’s legacy, now and forever.”
Ross and Healey will perform as part of what its promoters say is an all-star band playing the hits. “This will be a Badfinger reunion for them,” Strothmann noted in the separate interview.
Let It Be venue again ties Badfinger to the Beatles
Strothmann and Smith reserve some of their excitement for the Waukesha venue itself. Let It Be’s connection to the Beatles song and album and the venue’s Cavern Club stage design are among the reasons, but it goes deeper.
Meister, a deluxe music fan whose dedication has created two music-oriented venues, is a known personality in the area, Strothmann said, a fact that led to a direct interaction with him.
“The obvious Beatles themed [venue] was the first reason, but then when you meet Dave and actually see the venue itself, it was the only option for us. Dave has been helping us since we came to him,” Strothmann said. “He came to see The Loving Spoonful with me in Hartford a few months ago and told me how much he is looking forward to this event.”
Meister, whose diligent construction of Let It Be spanned several years and a slow rollout toward its full opening in January 2025, signed on to an event that is largely charitable, teaming with the nonprofit Chad Smith Foundation to help raise funds for scholarships and instruments for underserved youth in local after-school music programs.
“We’re always looking for a good cause that we want to support, because that’s what life is all about,” Meister said in a phone interview. “It’s about supporting each other.”
He acknowledged that the Beatles-and-Badfinger history together was fitting for Let It Be. “That was a nice factor,” Meister said.
The music will be performed on the Cavern Club-inspired stage beginning at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 28. (The restaurant itself opens at 5 p.m.) The event also includes video clips of a film by music documentary director John Anderson, a display of “rare” Badfinger memorabilia, and a complimentary CD and swag bag.
Tickets, sold online only through Let It Be, were limited to 120 people and were nearly all sold as of April 24. (Check online for availability.)
Who was Badfinger? A beginner’s guide
Granted, Badfinger’s time in the international spotlight is now 50 years out of date, but, like the Beatles themselves, the band’s history is hard to forget.
The hits began after the Iveys renamed themselves Badfinger in 1967, which Beatles historians have linked to “Bad Finger Boogie,” the working title for the Beatles’ tune that became “With a Little Help From My Friends,” the famous “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album track sung by Ringo Starr and cowritten by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
It wasn’t the only direct musical connection between the two groups.
Badfinger’s “Come and Get It,” their first hit (1970), was written and produced by McCartney. “Day After Day,” another iconic hit (1971), was produced by George Harrison. (The distinctive slide guitar in that tune carries Harrison’s trademark music style of that period.)
Even their 1970 hit “No Matter What” has a Beatles connection. It was produced by Mal Evans, the Beatles’ road manager and personal assistant until their famous breakup in 1970.
Ironically, “Without You,” written by Badfinger’s Pete Ham and Tom Evans and included on the group’s 1970 album “No Dice,” wasn’t a hit for the group. But it was a chart-topping hit for Harry Nilsson – by coincidence a close friend of the Beatles (particularly Lennon), the following year. And for Mariah Carey 23 years later. (According to Wikipedia, it has been covered 180 times by music artists.)
“Baby Blue,” written by Ham and produced by Todd Rundgren, in 1972 ranks among their iconic hits as well.
But, music historians note, Badfinger’s success crashed about the same time as Apple Records did in the acrimonious legal breakup of the Beatles (as a business entity) in the mid-1970s. The struggle to find new management led to bad choices and a strain to release new quality songs.
According to Milwaukee magazine, in a December 2009 article titled “Prisoners of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” the original Badfinger, desperate for bookings, became entangled with a Milwaukee promoter in 1982 who promised the group venues and lodgings but failed to deliver. Too broke to return home to England, the band remained in Milwaukee for several months.
Badfinger never regained its hyperbolic reputation as the next coming of the Beatles. But it’s not all bad, including their less-than-ideal Milwaukee stay, something that the event in Waukesha hopes to drive home.
“Their time here has not always been glorified, but it’s a fact that they did make wonderful memories and a lot of good came from their time in Milwaukee,” Strothmann said.
Contact reporter Jim Riccioli at james.riccioli@jrn.com.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Let It Be performance delves into Wisconsin ties of band Badfinger
Reporting by Jim Riccioli, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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