John Carter (musician)

Overview

Mainly popular in the 1960s and early 1970s, Carter's craftsmanship can be heard at work with:

Biography

Carter met his future songwriting partner Ken Hawker at school. They formed a skiffle band in the 1950s called LVI. It was then they began writing songs together: "We began to write real Buddy Holly take-offs. Which was good, it got us excited about songwriting." In 1960 the duo went to London and presented themselves under their songwriting pseudonyms John Carter and Ken Lewis. Terry Kennedy became their manager and convinced them to start their own band as an outlet for their songs. In 1961 the first single by Carter-Lewis and the Southerners was released, "Back on the Scene". But the band never broke through and their main claim to fame remains a brief stint that Jimmy Page did as their lead guitarist. In 1964 they met Perry Ford, who worked as an engineer in a small recording studio in Denmark Street, London. They noticed their voices blended well and started recording demos together, resulting in a single on Pye Records, "What More Do You Want" as the Ivy League. Their luck changed when Herman's Hermits recorded "Can't You Hear My Heartbeat" and took it to number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. In the UK it was a smaller hit for Goldie and the Gingerbreads.

They then provided backing vocals for "I Can't Explain", by the Who. In 1965 and 1966, The Ivy League scored four UK chart hits, including "Tossing and Turning", which reached number 3 in the UK Singles Chart. By early 1966 Carter decided he had had enough of touring and was replaced by Tony Burrows from The Kestrels. That year he married Gill Shakespeare who would later write lyrics for some of his songs. Carter concentrated on songwriting, providing hits for Peter and Gordon and Brenda Lee. He found a new songwriting partner in Geoff Stephens, resulting in "My World Fell Down", recorded by The Ivy League, later to be covered by Gary Usher's Sagittarius.

Carter sang lead on the New Vaudeville Band's hit single "Winchester Cathedral", a traditional pop pastiche that became a U.S. chart-topper. He also released a single, recorded with Mickey Keen and Robin Shaw, as The Ministry of Sound. Early in 1967, Ken Lewis quit the Ivy League and started writing and recording again with Carter. One of the first results was "Let's Go to San Francisco", released as the Flower Pot Men. As was the case with "Winchester Cathedral", when the recording, made by session musicians, became a hit, a band had to be assembled for live appearances.

In late 1967, Carter and Lewis formed Sunny Records as their production company. Starting early 1968 Carter's output became more and more confusing. Songs intended for the Flower Pot Men were released as Friends, Haystack and Dawn Chorus, only to be re-released in this century as the Flower Pot Men. The 'touring' Flower Pot Men were forced by Deram Records to record songs by Roger Greenaway and Roger Cook. As Mark Frumento wrote in the liner notes of the retrospective Flower Pot Men album Listen To the Flowers Grow (compiled by Carter): "At this point Deram decided that the Flower Pot Men name was no longer commercial and the next single, "Piccolo Man" was released as '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". After one abortive attempt the remains of the Flower Pot Men changed their name to White Plains.

The 1970s started with a disappointment when Mary Hopkin became runner-up in the Eurovision Song Contest with "Knock, Knock Who's There?", which Carter had written with Stephens.

Under the name John Shakespeare, Carter composed several film scores, including Death is a Woman (1966), The Hand of Night (1968), Connecting Rooms (1970), Secrets of a Door-to-Door Salesman (1973), The Great McGonagall (1974), The Over Amorous Artist (1974), The Sexplorer (1975), Secrets of a Superstud (1976), The Office Party (1976) and the controversial Killer's Moon (1978).

In the following years Carter released records under many names: Stamford Bridge (number 47 with "Chelsea"), Kincade ("Dreams Are Ten A Penny"), Scarecrow and Stormy Petrel. He also released a single as the Ohio Express, an American bubblegum group renowned for not playing or singing on most of their records. The hit came with "Beach Baby" by First Class in 1974. After two First Class albums, Carter started concentrating on writing advertising jingles. Among his work are commercials for Vauxhall Motors, British Caledonian and Rowntree's. His last shot at a hit single was in 1977 as Starbreaker with "Sound of Summer", which itself began life as music in a commercial for Butlin's.

In more recent times, Carter has been managing the marketing of his back catalogue through Sunny Records, releasing many songs that were never released at the time of recording. These included the compilation album, John Carter - A Rose by any Other Name (2005).