Badfinger : Airwaves

In 1978 they felt like reuniting and drummer Mike Gibbins had also been at a rehearsal before this recording. Unfortunately Mike quickly left again and he is therefore not on this album. The line-up is: Tom Evans: bas vocals; Joey Molland: guitar, vocals; Joe Tansin: lead guitar; Ken Harck: drums; Andy Newmark: drums and Nicky Hopkins: keyboards. Ken Harck left during the recording and he was replaced by Andy Newmark to finish the album. Joe Tansin left soon after the final recordings. Nicky Hopkins only work a session musician; he was not a member of the band.

The popular pop/rock music had changed during the 5 years since the last Badfinger album, so obviously the album had to be a lot different from their earlier albums. Producer David Malloy has often been critizised for poor production on this Badfinger album. "He had not been able to find the real Badfinger-sound". I think that's an unfair and wrong evaluation. Actually a lot of the album is pretty good. Tom Evans' songs Lost Inside Your Love and Sail Away are true highlights ( a version of Sail Away with bas, guitar and drums is supposed to have been recorded - I hope this will be featured as a bonus track on the CD-release ). Joey's Love is Gonna Come at Last is a very commercial number and it was released a single; it did not do ver y well, though. The Dreamer, also by Joey, is a nice ballad, a track you may not discover the two or three times you listen to the album; but it gets better every time. Joe Tansin wrote two songs for the album; Sympathy and The Winner. Sympathy is too commercial for my taste, almost disco-like; The Winner is a rocker similar to many of Joey's songs. Tansin shows on several tracks that he's a fabulous guitarist and some of the weaker tracks are helped a lot from his guitarplaying. The playing time is rather short, so luckily the CD version feature 5 bonus tracks.

Send Me Your Love A fine catchy pop ballad by Joe Tansin - it was written in the "Airwaves" days but recorded later by Tansin. When I first heard the guitar intro, I was sure that this was the "Molland" tune which I knew would be there.

Steal My Heart Another Tansin song from the "Airwaves" days recorded later. An uptempo poptune - not very interesting.

Love Can't Hide A Molland/Tansin collaboration. The sound of the rhythm guitar is very poor. Incredible that the sound could not have been improved. Molland is credited as the producer of it. The song is good - the lyrics sound familiar.

Can You Feel The Rain This last tune was recently written by Tansin to the memory of Tom Evans. A fine song, though a bit far from the original album.