The Turtles
The Turtles were an American rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in 1965. The band achieved several Top 40 hits throughout the latter half of the 1960s, including "It Ain't Me Babe", "You Baby", "Happy Together", "She'd Rather Be with Me", "Elenore", and "You Showed Me", with "Happy Together" reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100.
The group originally consisted of lead vocalist Howard Kaylan, backing vocalist Mark Volman, lead guitarist Al Nichol, rhythm guitarist Jim Tucker, bassist Chuck Portz, and drummer Don Murray, with subsequent members being bassists Chip Douglas and Jim Pons, and drummers Joel Larson, Johnny Barbata, and John Seiter.
As the Turtles' commercial success waned by the end of the 1960s, they became plagued with management problems, lawsuits and conflicts with their label, White Whale Records, leading the group to break up in 1970. Kaylan and Volman then joined Frank Zappa's band, the Mothers of Invention, where, for contractual reasons, they performed under the name Flo & Eddie. After leaving Zappa at the end of 1971, Kaylan and Volman continued to perform under the Flo & Eddie name, becoming popular as a comedy rock act, and also went on to long-lasting success as session musicians for artists including John Lennon, Bruce Springsteen, and Alice Cooper. In 1983, Kaylan and Volman began touring as The Turtles featuring Flo & Eddie. Kaylan ceased touring in 2018, while Volman continued to tour with the Turtles until his death in September 2025, with Ron Dante replacing Kaylan.
History
1963–1966: Formation, initial success and first personnel changes
The Nightriders, the Crossfires and the Tyrtles
In early 1963, New Yorker Howard Kaylan and Californian Mark Volman attended the same school, Westchester High in Los Angeles. The two sang in the school's a cappella choir, where Volman soon heard about Kaylan's instrumental surf music band, the Nightriders, which included Kaylan on saxophone and choir members Al Nichol on lead guitar, Don Murray on drums and Chuck Portz on bass. Volman joined the group as a saxophonist, just before the group changed its name to the Crossfires in the same year. After high school graduation, the band continued on while its members attended area colleges, picking up rhythm guitarist Jim Tucker as a sixth member along the way.They released a single, "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde" b/w "Fiberglass Jungle", on the local "Capco Records" label, eventually signing with newly formed White Whale Records. Adhering to the prevailing musical trend, the group rebranded itself in 1963: with the help of KRLA and KFWB DJ and club owner Reb Foster, the Crossfires signed as a folk rock band under the name The Tyrtles, an intentionally stylized misspelling inspired by the Byrds and the Beatles. However, the trendy spelling did not survive long, and they had to name themselves The Turtles.
Because of the stylistic change from "Surf music" to "Folk rock", Kaylan and Volman dropped the saxophones to become the band's vocalists. Kaylan became the group's lead singer and keyboardist. Volman began to harmonize with Kaylan's lead singing, becoming a third guitarist as well as a percussionist for the band.
"It Ain't Me Babe" and "You Baby"
As with the Byrds, the Turtles achieved breakthrough success with a cover of a Bob Dylan song. "It Ain't Me Babe" reached the Billboard Top 10 in the late summer of 1965, and was the title track of the band's first album. "Let Me Be", their second single, reached the Top 30, and "You Baby" charted in the Top 20 in early 1966. "You Baby", with its intricate vocal harmonies and upbeat tempo, was influential in the band's sound as it departed from the political, Byrds-type folk rock; the band's new sound ranged from chamber pop to straightforward pop music.You Baby, the band's second album, failed to reach Billboards Top LPs chart, and of several singles released in 1966, "Grim Reaper of Love" and "Can I Get to Know You Better" barely entered the Billboard Hot 100. One single, the tough "Outside Chance", written by Warren Zevon, did not chart. In 1966, the Turtles made an appearance in Universal's film Out of Sight, singing "She'll Come Back" on screen.
File:The Turtles 1966.png|thumb|The band in 1966. Top: Al Nichol, Jim Tucker, John Barbata. Middle: Howard Kaylan, Mark Volman. Bottom: Chuck Portz.
In early 1966, drummer Don Murray and bassist Chuck Portz quit the group. Murray was replaced by Joel Larson for a few months, before John Barbata became the band's new drummer in late 1966. Portz was replaced by Chip Douglas on bass.
1966–1968: Peak years
"Happy Together"
"Happy Together", the first of several key Turtles singles co-written by Garry Bonner and Alan Gordon, had been rejected by countless performers, but became the group's biggest hit and their signature song and signaled a turning point for both the Turtles and for Chip Douglas, who provided the arrangement. The single replaced the Beatles' "Penny Lane" at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in the spring of 1967. The Turtles' only No. 1 remained there for three weeks. An album of the same name followed and peaked at No. 25. "Happy Together" reached No. 12 on the UK Singles Chart. This same year saw the Turtles performing the title song for the Twentieth Century-Fox bedroom farce A Guide for the Married Man.Impressed by Chip Douglas's studio arrangements, Michael Nesmith approached him after a Turtles show at the Whisky a Go Go and invited him to become the Monkees' producer as that band wanted to break out of their "manufactured" studio mold. Douglas accepted and left the Turtles, producing the Monkees' next three albums: Headquarters; Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. ; and The Birds, the Bees & the Monkees, the last of which he co-produced with the band. Meanwhile, the Turtles continued with new bassist Jim Pons replacing Douglas.
"She'd Rather Be with Me", "You Know What I Mean" and "She's My Girl"
Other hits, all written by Gordon/Bonner, followed "Happy Together", making 1967 a lucrative year for the Turtles. A follow-up, the brassy "She'd Rather Be with Me", reached No. 3 on the US charts in late spring and actually out-charted "Happy Together" overseas, reaching No. 4 in the UK. Two successive Top 15 songs followed: "You Know What I Mean" and "She's My Girl". Both 45s showed a psychedelic side in the band's style. During that year, the band released two albums, Happy Together and Golden Hits, the former reaching the Top 30 and the latter reaching the Top 10. The similar album covers for Golden Hits and its 1970 companion More Golden Hits were designed by Dean Torrence of Jan & Dean.By the end of 1967 the band were reduced to a five-piece, when rhythm guitarist Jim Tucker departed, citing the pressure of touring and recording new material. He moved to Grass Valley, California where he became an electrical contractor. He has denied that he left the band because John Lennon was rude to him, as Kaylan later suggested in his 2003 film My Dinner with Jimi.
''The Turtles Present the Battle of the Bands''
"Sound Asleep" and "The Story of Rock and Roll", the first two singles in 1968, stalled somewhere in the middle of the Top 100. The band's fortunes changed when former member Chip Douglas returned to work with them as a producer. Late in 1968 the band released a concept album called The Turtles Present the Battle of the Bands, in which the group pretended to be 11 different bands, each with a song in a different genre. The album yielded two singles: "Elenore" and "You Showed Me", both peaking at No. 6. "Elenore" also reached No. 7 in the UK chart. Although both singles were successful, they did not help to boost the album's sales, which peaked at No. 128 on the Billboard Pop Albums. The 1969 hit "You Showed Me" had been written by the Byrds' Gene Clark and Roger McGuinn in 1964. It was their last Top 10 single. Television appearances included a February 1968 spot on The Mike Douglas Show, to which they returned in April 1969. 1969 saw the band undergo another personnel change, with drummer John Barbata being replaced by John Seiter.1969–1970: Commercial waning and break-up
''Turtle Soup''
Towards the end of 1969, the group released its next album, Turtle Soup, a critically well-received LP produced by Ray Davies of the Kinks. Inspired by the 1968 concept album The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society, this was Davies's only released production work for another band. Notable tracks include "Somewhere Friday Nite" and "Love in the City". In spite of Turtle Soups positive reception from the music press, its commercial success was marginal, and the band began to disintegrate.Conflicts with White Whale and disintegration
Long disillusioned with their record label and its growing financial problems by this time, Kaylan and Volman resisted White Whale's efforts to turn the Turtles into something approaching an assembly-line pop act, like the early Monkees. The label apparently encouraged Kaylan and Volman to fire the rest of the band, tour with hired musicians and make records by adding their vocals to backing tracks recorded by Memphis session players. Such pressure convinced the band to record a single called "Who Would Ever Think That I Would Marry Margaret?", which they disowned after its release.The Turtles wound down their career in 1970 with More Golden Hits, a second compilation album, and Wooden Head, a B-sides and rarities album. With the demise of the Turtles, White Whale Records lost its biggest moneymaker, had few commercially viable bands, and soon ceased operations.
Post-Turtles
1970s
In mid-1970, Kaylan and Volman joined Frank Zappa's band the Mothers of Invention, with Pons also joining in early 1971. As well as the Turtles' name, Kaylan and Volman were unable to use their real names in billings due to them being prohibited by their contract with their label White Whale Records. Because of this, Volman and Kaylan began performing under the nicknames the Phlorescent Leech & Eddie or Flo & Eddie for short. Kaylan, Volman, and Pons worked with Zappa until December 1971, when the infamous attack on Zappa at the Rainbow Theatre in London left him no choice but to cease touring for a while. During their time together the former Turtles appeared on several Zappa albums, as well as starring in his 1971 film 200 Motels. Volman and Kaylan then went on to make several duo albums, still using the Flo & Eddie name.Volman and Kaylan sang backing vocals on several recordings by the band T. Rex, including their worldwide 1971 hit "Get It On " and the albums Electric Warrior and The Slider. When White Whale's master recordings were sold at auction in 1974, the duo won the Turtles' masters, making them the owners of their own recorded work. They promptly licensed the tracks to Sire Records, which issued them as a compilation album titled Happy Together Again. In the mid-1970s, Volman and Kaylan started their syndicated radio show titled Flo & Eddie by the Fireside, which originated from KMET in Los Angeles.