Dan Matovina

[ablindpig]

Unfortunately, I just read online that Badfinger biographer Dan Matovina died at the age of 65 on June 2, 2023, after suffering from an unspecified long illness. RIP.

The following is a tribute that Beatles biographer, Kenneth Womack, posted in the Badfinger Facebook group:

Dan Matovina was a lot of things. A highly skilled audio engineer, he dedicated his professional life to getting the sound (and story) right. If you knew Dan, you understood implicitly that he was tireless, that he would stop at nothing when it came to bringing rock’s most dramatic narratives to life.

Perhaps this is why Dan was naturally drawn to Badfinger, easily the genre’s saddest story. In their musical infancy, Badfinger, especially singer-songwriters Pete Ham and Tom Evans, were brimming with promise. A terrible phalanx of managerial failures—along with good old-fashioned greed—cut their career short. But even still, they had already left behind a slew of classics, including “No Matter What,” “Baby Blue,” “Day After Day,” and “Without You,” the song that would become a juggernaut in other artists’ hands.

In his determination to capture the contours of their tragic tale of unmet potential, Dan authored the band’s esteemed biography, aptly entitled Without You-The Tragic Story of Badfinger (1997). With Ham and Evans’s suicides having effectively ended Badfinger’s story, he devoted his life to authoring a truthful biography about their lives and times. Without You accomplished this end in spades. In the process, Dan raised the level of scholarly expectations for rock biography.

In his work as both the band’s biographer and their rights manager, Dan was motivated by an abiding concern that Ham and Evans wouldn’t get ripped off yet again in death, just as they had been during their corporeal lives. Working closely with their estates, Dan salvaged their demos, along with those of the Iveys and Badfinger, to prepare them for release. He increased the estates’ income through the administration of a series of sync deals with the Super Bowl—who can forget that 2016 Heinz ketchup ad—and feature films (The Departed and The In-Laws, to name just a few). When it came to the small screen, Dan helped land high-profile exposure for the group on, most recently, Mrs. Davis. And no one who loves episodic television will be able to shake the image of Breaking Bad’s final scene as “Baby Blue” roars to life over the acclaimed TV show’s soundtrack.

In 2013, Dan ensured that a Blue Plaque was erected in Swansea, Wales, to celebrate Ham and his bandmates’ Welsh origins. Behind the scenes, he worked tirelessly to ensure that Badfinger’s Apple and Warner Brothers’ reissues were carried out with care, while also staging periodic tribute concerts in Wales and LA to celebrate their music for new generations of fans. Just last month, he supervised the release of Misunderstood, a digital album’s worth of Ham’s unreleased recordings and an unprecedented window into the singer-songwriter’s final months.

Recently, when Dan realized that folks were paying hundreds of dollars for tattered copies of Without You, which had sold out of its original run years ago, he threw himself headlong into compiling an eBook version of his classic biography. This latter aspect underscores Dan’s inherently generous nature. When he learned that I was working with the Evans family to tell the Beatles roadie’s tragic story, Dan leapt into action, providing sources and anecdotes to afford Big Mal’s tale with greater texture and meaning.

That’s Dan in a nutshell. If he knew you, he instinctively wanted the best for you, to help out in any way that he possibly could. Whether it meant making a book more affordable for readers or sharing Badfinger’s incredible story with the masses, he was there.

Kenneth Womack

[stereohysteria]

Really very sad news. Dan's advocacy for the Ham and Evans estates was tireless, and the posthumous collections of Pete Ham demos he compiled (including the recently-released "Misunderstood") demonstrate Pete's exceptional musical talents as well as any Badfinger album.

[ToddS]

Yes , Bad Sad News Indeed . I bought his Badfinger Book years ago and still use it for reference .

[Kwai Chang]

You want tragedy?
Being stuck on a Kindle while wanting to comment on the two awesome pieces of writing above is pure...
Remember that Badfinger have yet to find their peak of fluorescence in the rock and roll garden of Eden. You can call it Inna Godda Da Fingah, or Earth, or anything!
I'm here for the Apple!
Thank you, ablindpig, for the well written tributes to Dan by Kenneth Womack and Tom Brennan!
Finally, to Dan Matovina, you made them great(if not a bit late) but, they are going to hit eventually! No one knows!
R.I.P.
KC

[Chicagofanforever 5+]

Sad news!

Nice tribute by Ken Womack.

When I bought Dan's Badfinger book back when it came out I had trouble putting it down. So much fantastic information. And then all his work on bringing the band back to the ears of the public. The true fans knew how good they were but he brought them a step further.

His demos projects gave us the chance to hear things we could only dream of.

Thanks Dan,
RIP

[Ronson]

Very sad. I first met Dan in the 1980s when he was producing The Clints. He was the consummate professional; a stickler for detail. He was funny, he was intelligent, and he had a big heart.

One thing many people did not know about Dan is that Pete Ham's brother, John, gave him all of Pete's demo tapes. At the time, John Ham was estranged from Pete's posthumous family in Scotland (around 1993) and he wasn't interested in getting the tapes to them. Dan could have copyrighted them and released them for his own profit, but instead, he said they morally belonged to Pete's daughter and he endeavored to get them to her. And she became the owner.

A great guy. I will sorely miss him.

[Jerry4]

Very sad news. His Badfinger biography is simply one the very best rock biography's ever written.

The Badfinger folks have lost a strong voice for helping their legacy.

[WOA76]

I know Dan for over 25 years and I didn't know was post this and glad someone did thank you

I was talking to him two days before he had not been well

I was talking to Marianne Evens Tommy's wife and she is super upset he become part of small Badfinger family


THANK YOU FOR talking about Dan ill miss him

I lost two good friends this year King Size Taylor in January now Dan