The Flower Pot Men | |
---|---|
Background information | |
Also known as | Flower Pot Men |
Origin | England |
Genres | |
Years active | 1967–1970 |
Labels | Deram |
Spinoffs | White Plains |
Past members | Personnel |
The Flower Pot Men (sometimes spelled The Flowerpot Men) were an English pop group created in 1967 as a result of the single "Let's Go to San Francisco", recorded by session musicians, which became a major UK Top 20 and Continental Europe hit in the autumn of 1967. [1] The group's sound was characterised by rich, three-part vocal harmonies.[ citation needed ]
The Flower Pot Men were a studio recording construct created by John Carter and Ken Lewis, originally the main songwriters of The Ivy League. They notably were featured as backup vocalists for early Who albums and for the first recording of a song that Sagittarius covered, "My World Fell Down". [2] Ken Lewis departed as a result of his lack of interest in touring, and Carter joined him soon after to create a musical songwriting duo.[ citation needed ]
"Let's Go to San Francisco" was written and recorded by John Carter and Ken Lewis, a songwriting team known as Carter & Lewis. [1] The composition, psychedelic in nature, took vocal and instrumental inspiration from The Beach Boys. [3] The name The Flower Pot Men was derived from the BBC children's show Flower Pot Men , with the obvious psychedelic era puns on flower power and "pot" (cannabis). In the US, they were commonly deemed The Flower Men on radio airplay to avoid the drug reference. [4]
The duo licensed the recording to Deram Records, who had a hit but no group to promote it. Carter and Lewis, having no interest in going on the road to promote the record, created the group from a hand-picked collective of recording studio session musicians and vocalists. Led by vocalist Tony Burrows, Neil Landon, Pete Nelson, Robin Shaw, the band also included Billie Davis's backing band, and for a while (though not for recordings) later Deep Purple members Jon Lord, who replaced Billy Davidson on keyboards in January 1968, and Nick Simper on bass.
Carter and Lewis continued to write, record and produce most of the band's subsequent recordings over the next three years. [1]
The follow-up to "Let's Go to San Francisco" was the similar-sounding "A Walk in the Sky", released in November 1967. It was not a hit in the UK, but reached No. 4 in the Netherlands and also proved popular in Germany. Carter and Lewis continued writing and recording new material, but Deram wanted another hit to rival the success of "Let's Go to San Francisco". When the third Carter-Lewis single "Man Without a Woman" / "You Can Never Be Wrong" failed to chart in April 1968, the label had the touring band record "In A Moment of Madness" by Roger Greenaway without the involvement of Carter and Lewis, which also failed to chart. As Mark Frumento wrote in the liner notes of the retrospective Flower Pot Men album, Listen to the Flowers Grow: "At this point Deram decided that the Flower Pot Men name was no longer commercial and the next single, "Piccolo Man" was released under the band name 'Friends' ... The final Flower Pot Men single was released in 1969, but this time the writing team Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway were behind the production."
The line-up of the Flower Pot Men had changed considerably by then. Lord and Simper left in summer 1968, Neil Landon left in December 1968 to become lead singer of Fat Mattress. Neil was then replaced by backing band member Ricky Wolff in January 1969. [5] [6] Wolff, Burrows, Shaw and Nelson stayed with Roger Greenaway and Roger Cook, added new musicians and changed their name to White Plains, who scored a hit with "My Baby Loves Lovin'" in 1970. The Flower Pot Men dissolved at that point. [1]
Burrows and Shaw later surfaced in another John Carter project, The First Class, whose sole Top 40 hit was "Beach Baby". A harmony phrase shortly before the fade out of this record referenced "Let's Go to San Francisco". Carter also recorded a track "Let's Go Back To San Francisco (Parts 1 and 2)", released as 'Beautiful People' in 1981. Later the song appeared on a First Class retrospective and ultimately appeared on a compilation album by the Flower Pot Men.
In 2000 Carter released a CD Peace Album / Past Imperfect that comprised two unreleased Flower Pot Men albums recorded between 1967 and 1969. Burrows still performs on the oldies circuit as does Landon. Shaw is still on the road with White Plains.
In the liner notes of Listen to the Flowers Grow (RPM Retro 809) from April 2007, Mark Frumento mentioned that "sadly, Pete Nelson died a few years ago." [7] [8]
Tony Burrows worked with different bands including White Plains, Edison Lighthouse, Brotherhood of Man and the Pipkins and as a solo artist.
Robin Shaw would be the bass guitarist for Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers from 1988 to 2002.
After a short stint in a band called Zenith in 1974, Pete Nelson retired from the music industry.
Lord and Simper's connection to this pop band was later lampooned in the fake rock documentary Spinal Tap , whose fictional first hit was called "(Listen to the) Flower People", a reference to "Let's Go to San Francisco".
From 2004 to 2006, Shaw was part of a reformed version of White Plains. A reunion tour took place in 2013, which featured Shaw and Burrows.
Pete Nelson (born 10 March 1943) died in Ealing, London on 23 October 2005, at the age of 62, after a short battle with cancer.
Neil Landon (born 26 July 1941) died in Hamburg, Germany on 26 March 2020, at the age of 78, after a short battle with cancer.
Nicholas John Simper is an English bass guitarist, who was a co-founding member of Deep Purple and Warhorse. In the 1960s, he began his professional career in bands such as Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, The Flower Pot Men, and Lord Sutch's Savages.
Honeybus were a 1960s pop group formed in April 1967, in London. They are best known for their 1968 UK top 10 hit single, "I Can't Let Maggie Go", written by group member Pete Dello who also composed their previous single "(Do I Figure) In Your Life", later recorded by Dave Berry, Ian Matthews, Joe Cocker, Dave Stewart, Paul Carrack, Samantha Jones, Dana, Pierce Turner, and Euros Childs.
Anthony Burrows is an English pop singer and recording artist. As a prolific session musician, Burrows was involved in several transatlantic hit singles throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, most of which were one-hit wonders, including "Love Grows " by Edison Lighthouse, "United We Stand" by Brotherhood of Man, "My Baby Loves Lovin'" by White Plains, "Gimme Dat Ding" by the Pipkins and "Beach Baby" by the First Class.
Blue Mink were a British six-piece pop group that existed from 1969 to 1977. Over that period they had six Top 20 hit singles in the UK Singles Chart, and released five studio based albums. According to AllMusic: "they have been immortalised on a string of compilation albums, each recounting the string of effervescent hits that established them among Britain's best-loved pop groups of the early 1970s."
The First Class were a British pop music studio-based group, put together by songwriter and record producer John Carter. They are best known for their hit song "Beach Baby," a top 20 hit in both the US and UK, and number one in Canada..
Carter-Lewis and the Southerners were an early-1960s rock band, formed by the Birmingham-born musicians Ken Lewis and John Carter.
Roger Frederick Cook is an English singer, songwriter and record producer, who has written many hit records for other recording artists. He has also had a successful recording career in his own right.
Roger John Reginald Greenaway is an English singer, songwriter and record producer, best known for his collaborations with Roger Cook and Tony Burrows. His compositions have included "You've Got Your Troubles" and the transatlantic million selling songs "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing " and "Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress". They were the first UK songwriting partnership to be granted an Ivor Novello Award as 'Songwriters of the Year' in two successive years.
White Plains were a British pop music group that existed from 1969 to 1976. They had an ever-changing line-up of musicians and five UK hit singles, all on the Deram Records label, in the early 1970s.
John Nicholas Shakespeare, known as John Carter, is an English singer, songwriter, and record producer.
One Piece at a Time is the 54th album by American country singer Johnny Cash, released in 1976 on Columbia Records. "One Piece at a Time," which was a #1 hit, is a humorous tale of an auto worker on the Detroit assembly line who puts together a car out of parts he swipes from the plant. "Sold Out of Flag Poles" also charted as a single, reaching #29 on the country singles charts. "Committed to Parkview", a Cash original, would be re-recorded in 1985 by Cash, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson and Willie Nelson, collectively known as The Highwaymen, on their first album, Highwayman; it is one of the few country songs sung from the perspective of a patient at a mental hospital.
United We Stand is the debut album by The Brotherhood of Man. It was released in 1970 on Deram.
Kenneth Alan James Hawker known as Ken Lewis, was an English singer, songwriter and record producer. He is considered one of the more successful songwriters of the 1960s as a result of his collaborations with John Carter. His biggest success was "Can't You Hear My Heartbeat", which was a 1965 US number 2 hit single for Herman's Hermits.
"Beach Baby" is a song by the British band The First Class. Written by John Carter and his wife, Gillian (Jill) Shakespeare, the song became the band's only substantial hit. The subject of the lyrics is not holiday love, but a broken love relationship between two high school students in Los Angeles in the 1950s.
"My Baby Loves Lovin'" was first released by the British pop group White Plains. The song was written and produced by Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway, recorded on 26 October 1969, and released on 2 January 1970 on the Decca Records imprint, Deram Records. It is a world-wide chart success and the top selling single for White Plains.
Neil Landon was an English singer, who has been credited with singing on a number of hits in the UK Singles Chart. In addition, he was a singer and songwriter with the band Fat Mattress, which he co-founded with guitarist/singer Noel Redding.
"Let's Go to San Francisco" is the only UK-charting single by the British pop group The Flower Pot Men. The song was written and produced by John Carter and Ken Lewis, engineered by John Mackswith and released in 1967 on 7" single format. Carter also sang the lead vocal in the recording. It is regarded as a work of the 1960s California Sound.
The Ivy League were an English vocal trio, formed in 1964, who enjoyed two top 10 hit singles on the UK Singles Chart in 1965. The group's sound was characterised by rich, three-part vocal harmonies.
"When You Are a King" is a 1971 pop song by British band White Plains. It was written by John and Roger Hill, in contrast to most White Plains songs that were written by Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway. Produced by Roger Greenaway. Featuring Pete Nelson on lead vocals.
Wanda Jackson in Person is a live album by American recording artist Wanda Jackson. It was released in October 1969 via Capitol Records and contained ten tracks. The project was Jackson's first live album in her career and was recorded at Mr. Lucky's, a performance venue in Phoenix, Arizona.
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