Mal Evans - After The Beatles

After The Beatles

In 1968, Evans saw the group Badfinger play live (then known as The Iveys), and suggested that they be signed to Apple. Evans then produced several songs recorded by The Iveys/Badfinger during 1969 and 1970. The most notable of these is "No Matter What", which charted on Billboard's Top 10 in December 1970. Evans also discovered the group Splinter and brought them to the Apple label, although they would subsequently move to George Harrison's Dark Horse Records. Evans' other production credits include Jackie Lomax's 1969 single, "New Day" (on Apple), and some of the tracks on Keith Moon's only solo album, Two Sides of the Moon (1975).

Evans separated from his wife in 1973, and moved from the UK to Los Angeles, where Lennon had moved to live with May Pang after his own separation from Yoko Ono. Evans is credited on Harrison's All Things Must Pass, and the John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band album, providing "tea and sympathy". Evans co-wrote "You and Me (Babe)" with Harrison, which appeared on Starr's solo album in 1973; Ringo. He also co-wrote the Splinter song "Lonely Man", the musical centrepiece of Little Malcolm; an Apple feature film produced by Harrison.

Evans was asked to produce the group Natural Gas, and was working on a book of memoirs called Living The Beatles' Legend, which he was due to deliver to his publishers, Grosset & Dunlap, on 12 January 1976. Evans was depressed about the separation from his wife—who had asked for a divorce before Christmas—even though he was then living with his new girlfriend, Fran Hughes, in a rented motel apartment at 8122 West 4th Street, Los Angeles.