Pioneer of the Stars: The Bad Angel’s Early Career

 

The above song, a hit for the Ohio-born Wilson in 1968, was written by a then 55 year-old Frank Stanton with a much younger man going by the name of Andy Badale.

At the same time, this Badale was also working with ondioline maestro Jean-Jacques Perrey, co-writing and producing large chunks of Perrey’s two solo albums for Vanguard, The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound and Moog Indigo. Earlier, Badale was credited as co-composer on two Perrey & Kingsley tracks, ‘Visa to the Stars’ (from The In Sound From Way Out) and ‘Pioneers of the Stars’ (on Kaleidoscopic Vibrations).



After that, however, Badale’s trail starts to go a little cold. He wrote a few songs for Shirley Bassey, and for the Ossie Davis movie Howard’s War, and even wrote all the backing music for this children’s story.



But that was not the end of Badale’s career. Far from it. For you can see Badale playing the piano 7 minutes and 53 seconds into the following clip, having been offered the part by the film’s director after being hired as a vocal coach to the film’s Italian star.


By this time, Badale had started using the name he was born with, Angelo Badalamenti, and with that name, of course, he went on to work on many more films, notably with David Lynch.