Matovina's title doesn't lie: The story of Badfinger, a band that was chained to the Beatles in the press, repeatedly and ridiculously screwed over by its management, and which lost two of its members to suicide, is definitely a tragic one. Matovina worked for decades on this book -- interviewing the surviving band members (to the extent that they let him), their families, girlfriends, roadies, producers, engineers, and anyone else connected with the band. The strength of the book lies in these interviews, and for the most part Matovina does a nice job of piecing together the chronology of the band. The book is also liberally sprinkled with personal and professional pictures of the band and their friends and family, and this really helps break up the sometimes dense details and give some life to the narrative.

The author is at his worst when trying to describe what the music sounds like. Like really pretty bad. It's not an easy task to talk about music, and I think that task is made even harder when you are such a superfan. If Matovina could have cut down on those sections, and gotten an editor that could shape up his sometimes runaway sentences, he would have ended up with a much more readable book.

[full review here: http://spacebeer.blogspot.com/2009/05/without-you-tragic-story-of-badfinger.html ] ( )