Glam rock turned into shock rock when Bonavega walked onto the imposing stage of America’s Got Talent earlier this summer.
His Gary Glitter meets Adam Ant vibe stuffed in a hardbody with a mullet and mustache was greeted with angst, bewilderment, and trepidation by audience and judges alike.
For Bonavega, real name Branden Wilbarger, who left hometown Toledo for glitzy Los Angeles seven years ago in pursuit of an opportunity such as this, his first prime-time performance on NBC’s hit show appeared to be his last.
Even the normally relaxed and fun-natured Heidi Klum, one of the show’s four celebrity judges, was concerned enough to remark, “I’m scared.” And this was before he ripped off his gold-patterned robe like an over-eager Magic Mike and launched into his act.
“I honestly didn’t know how it was going to go,” Mr. Wilbarger, 31, said in a recent phone interview from his L.A. home. “But I usually know within 10 seconds whether an audience really likes it or really hates it.”
More than two minutes later, Ms. Klum and another judge, Howie Mandel, were on their feet, as was the entire audience, applauding and cheering Bonavega following his highly choreographed ’80s music spectacle of glammed-up, sexed-up prancing, dancing, gyrating, guitar-shredding, and pointing to the crowd.
And Mr. Wilbarger remembers almost none of it.
“It was pretty crazy,” he said of his performance and the reaction. “But as soon as I ripped off my robe and revealed my outfit and heard the crowd’s reaction, I knew it was going to be OK.”
Bonavega was given the go-ahead by the four judges to continue in the show. Weeks later, he learned via video reveal that he will be competing in America’s Got Talent live competition, with a performance scheduled Tuesday, which can be seen locally beginning at 8 p.m. on WNWO-TV, Channel 24.
For his audition performance, Mr. Wilbarger said he didn’t know how the judges would respond to Bonavega, or even whether the talent show was a suitable match for his risqué act. It was those unknowns that tempered Mr. Wilbarger’s own expectations if the show would go on for Bonavega.
But Bonavega’s enthusiastic reception quashed any of Mr. Wilbarger’s self-doubt that he can be crowned the winner of this season’s America’s Got Talent. “Now I’m very energized to move forward.”
He is not so certain how his appearance was received in his hometown.
As Mr. Wilbarger said in a quick behind-the-scenes interview that introduced Bonavega to the TV audience: “Toledo is definitely a small town, and my parents were very strict so a lot of the music I was interested in was not allowed, so it was very hard to express myself creatively. I realized that if I really wanted to pursue music in a real way I was going to have to get out of Ohio.”
The youngest child and only son of Jeff and Diana Wilbarger, he grew up in a strict evangelical home, where the only approved secular music were the Beatles, jazz, and classical. And so he resorted to smuggling cassette tapes of classic rock acts like the Doors, Led Zeppelin, and Queen into his home, and would listen to their music under his covers at night while his family slept.
“That cliche movie moment? That was me,” Branden Wilbarger said.
He was also a gifted musician, playing drums by the age of 10, and picking up the guitar a few years later.
“I remember him excelling musically and being really good in middle school,” said his sister, Lindsey Melden, 33, wife of Toledo City Councilman Sam Melden. “By eighth or ninth grade he was playing in bands with his buddies and opening for bigger bands.”
Mr. Wilbarger and his sister attended a pair of private schools where their father taught math, Toledo Christian and later Emmanuel Christian, from which he graduated in 2007. After high school, Mr. Wilbarger spent a year at Owens Community College taking music classes and honing his guitar skills, gigged around town with friends, and worked as a waiter, saving $10,000 once he committed to the idea of moving across the country.
Mr. Wilbarger said his parents didn’t approve of the choices he made once he was out of their home and on his own — including his career decision to relocate to Los Angeles — but didn’t stand in the way of them, either.
But that was also before Bonavega, the glamorous and kitschy frontman that screams of the excess and decadence of the 1970s and 1980s. A combination of Mr. Wilbarger’s passion for professional wrestling and stage musicals, with a nod to Eddie Van Halen’s guitar wizardry, Bonavega was formed during open-mic nights in and around L.A., and has served as a songwriting cipher. Mr. Wilbarger wanted to be a guitarist when he moved to L.A., but has since developed a penchant for ’80s pop-rock and its weirdly intoxicating mix of bouncy melodies, suggestive lyrics, and serious but never heady messages.
The first time Bonavega performed in front of a small crowd, their reaction was much like his performance on America’s Got Talent: no one knew what to think of the spectacle onstage performing an original song that would have fit nicely on a setlist for George Michael.
“I could hear people snickering in the crowd, but in a good way,” Mr. Wilbarger said. “That fed into the act a little bit and I started getting audience reaction from doing whatever felt natural to do,” including ripping off his shirt.
“It’s always been what was natural to the moment. Most stuff wasn’t contrived.”
Bonavega has since built up a small cultish following, with several videos on YouTube, including Overdrive, the autobiographical song he performed for his audition: “Slow down and do what you're told, I hear it everywhere that I go/But I'm free and ready to be something that is out of control.”
After the show aired, Mr. Wilbarger received a text from his father that said he recognized his son’s talent and that he loved him, but didn’t congratulate him on his success.
“They definitively don’t approve of the way that I’m expressing myself,” he said. “I think I can feel their inner-conflict. They can tell something is happening for me that’s positive and you can’t deny that people think it’s fun and that it was a fun thing. But they have that inner-conflict because of their world view, which is what is really making it difficult for them to appreciate it.
“So it’s kind of sad in a way, but they’re definitely trying, but it’s definitely very difficult for them to approve of it.”
And then Mr. Wilbarger stopped and reconsidered what he said.
“I said they’re trying but I don’t know if they are trying.”
In an email to The Blade, Branden Wilbarger’s father said, “My wife, Diana, and I love Branden. We also love the fact that he is so talented and creative. However, we are disappointed he is performing in a way that we believe is sexually provocative, not pleasing to God, and in a way that we would not want our granddaughters to see. Of course, [America’s Got Talent] is trying to be a ‘family-approved' show, so his performance for them was much milder in contrast to the videos he has been producing.
“We realize there are many people who do not share our Christian worldview and would think we are close-minded or old-fashioned in thinking this way, and I respect their right to disagree with our opinion. The important thing to me is that you understand that we love Branden and we respect his right as an adult man to live his life as he sees fit. … However, although we love him, we do not love his performances.”
His sister, though, said she was moved while watching Bonavega’s America’s Got Talent debut, and remains supportive of her brother.
“I was watching it live and it just brought me so much joy,” Mrs. Melden said. “He was just so himself and so into it, and his enthusiasm was contagious.”
Wilbarger said he understands why his parents don’t approve of his stage persona.
“I used to live with them,” he said. “They’re coming from a conservative evangelical background, so I get why they can’t support it.”
Despite the appearances and actions of his not-so-alter ego, Bonavega, Mr. Wilbarger insisted he has not drifted too far from his religious upbringing, even some 2,200 miles away.
“You do get taught some core values, like being kind to others,” he said. “The core values are there.”
First Published August 16, 2020, 4:00 p.m.
