FTV: Flo & Eddie
Flo & Eddie are actually four different people who co-existed in two different bands. There is an entire tail twisting story behind the name so I am going to do my best to unravel it for you. Two of the people known as Flo & Eddie are actually Mark Volman and Howard Kaylan from the band The Turtles (see FTV: The Turtles 3-4-26 in our archives). Though Volman passed away in September of 2025 and Kaylan officially retired from the road in 2018 (for health reasons), their influences in the music world remain strong. Let us briefly recap what happened to The Turtles before we get into the meat of the Flo & Eddie story.
Starting out as The Crossfires, they were a group of high school classmates who formed a popular band in Westchester, California (just south of Los Angeles). Howard Kaylan’s family had migrated from New York and Mark Volman was a California boy. The Crossfires were originally an instrumental surf band and Volman asked if he could join. He was originally a roadie but as they added more songs with vocals, the Kaylan / Volman duo’s harmonies became a vital part of their sound. Once they signed to White Whale Records and changed their name to The Turtles, they went from being a teenage dance band to a formidable touring group with many hit records. As the latter, they explored all of the excesses one can imagine for a popular touring band right up to the point when it all imploded. By 1970, The Turtles were done.
When the end came, Kaylan and Volman finally realized exactly how bad their initial contract with White Whale was. The label owned their catalog and the vast majority of the money that came in from The Turtles recordings went to White Whale. Lawsuits would follow, but the short version was brutal: Howard and Mark were not able to profit from their previous hit records and the label even prevented them from using The Turtles name (nor their own names). In order to continue in the music profession, they became Flo & Eddie. The original Flo (the shortened form of ‘Phlorescent Leach’) and Eddie were actually two of The Turtles road crew (Carlos and Denny). Mark was supposed to be Eddie but an early press mix up misidentified them so he became Flo and Howard became Eddie. Coming right on the heels of their success with The Turtles, they weren’t quite ready to strike out on their own or resort to getting ‘real jobs’.
Interestingly enough, one of their acquaintances up in Laurel Canyon was a relatively unknown composer and musician named Frank Zappa. ‘Avante garde’ would be an understated way of explaining the music Zappa produced with his band, The Mothers of Invention. Zappa knew of The Turtles, their origins as a surf band, the fact that they had broken up, and even that Volman and Kaylan played saxophone. Out of the blue, he invited them to a barbeque at his house and told them to bring their horns. After a little jamming, he suggested they put the horns down (the Mothers included some top notch musicians like reed player Ian Underwood so no doubt Frank was more interested in their vocal prowess). When Frank started telling members of the band he was thinking of asking the duo to join the Mothers, the reaction was pretty universal: “Why? What are those guys going to bring into the band?” Frank simply said, “Well, you’ll be surprised.”
Volman expanded on the Zappa angle: “Once we joined Frank and he started to become more successful, people stopped liking him because of us. We brought a certain amount of commerciality to it that Frank liked but his diehard fans didn’t. I don’t know what they were expecting, but there were certain fans from the early years who were vehement about how distasteful we were to the band, how much they disliked us being part of the Mothers.” British drummer Ansley Dunbar was among the early doubters about the move, but eventually he had a change of heart. Dunbar says, “Most people are really serious. I played with John Mayall who was absolutely serious. We had serious musicians [in the Mothers] and sometimes they forget that they are actually playing for people out there. [Flo & Eddie] did a hell of a job. In the end, I was really happy that they were in the band, because they made a big difference.”
Playing with Frank Zappa could be a challenge. In spite of the image he had, he disdained drug use and expected his band to keep their heads on straight. He loosened up some when Flo & Eddie demonstrated they could still bring the goods while imbibing on their own time. He used them both vocally and comedically right up until the end of the Mothers. Certainly you have heard the story via Deep Purple’s iconic smash hit: We all came out to Montreaux / On the Lake Geneva shoreline / Frank Zappa and the Mothers were at the best place in town / But some stupid with a flare gun, burned the place to the ground . Yes, the Smoke on the Water fire damage included the Mother’s touring equipment, but this wasn’t the end of the band. Frank was ready to pull the plug on the last two weeks of the European tour but the band (who got paid by the gig) convinced him to carry on.
The next leg of the tour ended the Mothers of Invention for good but not in a triumphant way. The last shows in France and Belgium were canceled but the December 10 and 11 performances at The Rainbow Theater in London were not. Playing rented equipment (with no mention of the cowbell that was reportedly rescued from the ashes in Montreaux), they made it to the encore (The Beatles I Wanna Hold Your Hand). A fan rushed the stage and pushed Zappa off the front of the stage. When he landed 12 feet below, even Frank thought he might be dead. He suffered serious injuries that would put in a wheelchair and keep him off the stage for nearly a year. The band, left without any other options, drifted apart and on to other gigs. Flo & Eddie caused some stir when they jokingly said Frank had jumped into the orchestra pit. At least they were able to repair this rift with Zappa before he died of cancer in 1993, but the Mothers never performed as a unit again.
When they were touring Europe with Frank in 1970, Flo & Eddie were called upon to add background vocals for Marc Bolan’s T-Rex album Electric Warrior Yes, that is their voices on Bolan’s massive hits, Hot Love and Bang a Gong (Get It On). Those sessions did not start off well. Famed producer Tony Visconti and engineer Roy Thomas Baker had questions about Volman’s rather unfriendly comments at their first meeting. Guitarist Jeff Skunk explained that Mark only made fun of people he respected and eventually Visconti and Baker got it (Flo’s sense of humor) and they did enjoy working on the vocal tracks with the duo.
Flo & Eddie would probably have continued to work with Bolan but when they dared to ask to be paid, Marc was done with them. For some reason he felt people should just do things for him for free. Visconti said he and Bolan ended up mimicking Flo & Eddie’s style for a while before hiring female singers to hit the high notes. This rift was never healed as Bolan died from injuries on September 16, 1977 when his girlfriend lost control of their car and hit a fence post and a tree. Bolan did not drive so the accident was attributed to her driving drunk and Marc not wearing a seatbelt.
In the wake of Zappa’s accident, Volman and Kaylan went on to record an album (The Phlorescent Leech & Eddie) for Reprise Records (released in 1972). They used what was left of the Mothers of Invention for the first recording. The album wasn’t a success, but they kept releasing albums as Flo & Eddie (including Flo & Eddie, Illegal, Immoral and Fattening, Moving Targets, and Rock Steady with Flo & Eddie) and touring. They were the opening act on Alice Cooper’s School’s Out show in Munich in November of 1972 and on the Billion Dollar Babies Tour in 1973. Cooper invited them to add background vocals to his next three albums. They had no trouble finding studio work in the early 1980s and can be heard on various hits including Bruce Springsteen’s Hungry Heart (1982).
I missed the opportunity to see Flo & Eddie at NMU when they played a concert in the big gym next to the Hedgecock Field house. The date was Thursday September 12, 1973 and I remember seeing the posters. The fact I didn’t go tells me that my band Knockdown had a gig that night. We had a monthly Thursday to Saturday engagement at the NCO Club at K.I.Sawyer Airforce Base so this would match up with me missing it. I didn’t recognize the guys on the poster and had not heard about the adventures of Flo & Eddie at that time. I later regretted not getting to see them but as fate would have it, I would get a second chance in Calumet.
It wasn’t all smooth sailing and laughs. At the beginning of a tour opening for The Doobie Brothers, band member Phil Reed fell ten stories to his death. Drugs were plentiful at the time and there were some heavy drug guys about, but the circumstances of his fall were unclear. He wasn’t suicidal, there was no evidence of foul play, and it may have been nothing more than a stupid accident – the jury is still out to this day. In the aftermath, Flo & Eddie decided it was time to take a year off and regroup. When they began getting back to work, one of the gigs they took on was doing music for the animated Care Bears and Strawberry Shortcake series. As they joked at the Calumet Theater show, “See? We have been corrupting your kids for decades!”
In the early 1980s, Flo & Eddie managed to finally get their catalog and name back. When The Turtles dissolved, they had paid the other band members off so they could keep the name (before they learned they couldn’t use it) and profits from band merchandise. After performing for many years as Flo & Eddie (and later as The Turtles featuring Flo & Eddie), 1984 saw them hit the road as a way to cash in on past glories. They got together with Spank and Our Gang, Gary Puckett (minus the Union Gap), and The Association for a nationwide tour billed as The Happy Together Tour. The concert data base I looked at showed them playing Lakeview Arena in Marquette during this jaunt. The next year, the Turtles did another Happy tour, this time with the Buckinghams, Gary Lewis, and the Grass Roots. The tour was out for eight months and was one of the top ten concert draws that year.
The next step was to try a version of this coast to coast touring, but only as The Turtles. They employed musicians from both coasts (they called them the West and East Coast bands). Whichever musicians were closest to the next gig would get flown in for the show. Equipment was rented meaning they didn’t have to truck it all over the place. We got to see a matinee of this arrangement at the Calumet Theater back in the early 2000s, back when the theater insisted that bands do two shows on one day. The drummer (Joe Stefko) had recently appeared on Broadway as a member of Big Brother and the Holding Company in Love Janice. The keyboard player named Benji I later found out had worked with guitarist Mark Tomorsky from Measured Chaos (Al Jacquez’s band who played the Ontonagon Theater twice in the early 2000s).
Our old radio station go-to techie Mark Szaroletta was backstage running the stage monitors for the Calumet show. Mark said when the band arrived, Volman came in the back door, looked around and said, “Hey, I thought they had torn down all these dumps!” (or words to that effect). Naturally, being the sharp guy he was, Flo immediately read the faces of the theater volunteers around him and walked back what he had just meant as a joke: “No, hey, I am kidding. We really do love these old theaters and this one is great,” (again, words to that effect). When Volman did the offstage introduction for the show, he was back in form, saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, will you please welcome to… where are we again?… to the Calumet Theater, The Turtles!”
I got to see them interact with fans after the show and one could see they were enjoying the meet and greet even with another show scheduled. WOAS-FM had one of the first digital cameras that were on the market so I took the opportunity to get a quick photo with drummer Joe Stefko (Flo & Eddie were surrounded by that time). Stefko seemed pleased when I mentioned how much I enjoyed his drumming. He explained he doesn’t usually like playing rented kits but this one was fine after he found enough cymbals. After all the years of computer changes at the school, I am not sure where this photo is archived, but maybe I will find it one day. The photo was nice, but Stefko is a rather short individual so I looked like Godzilla standing next to him. Mark said they were looking for someone to man the follow-spotlight in the second balcony for the evening show but it wasn’t in the cards for me to help out. I later regretted not making the time, but on the other hand, I have been on that balcony before and I remember getting a distinct case of vertigo looking down from the front row where the spotlight was rigged.
In 1992, at the age of 45, Volman started working on a bachelor’s degree at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. He completed his studies in 1997 and as a magna cum laude class valedictorian, he spoke at the commencement ceremony. The CBS Evening News covered the story as Mark led the graduates in a chorus of Happy Together. After completing a Master’s degree in Fine Arts (also from Loyola), he taught Music Business & Industry courses at Loyola. Volman would go on to be a professor and coordinator of the Entertainment Industry Studies Program at Belmont University in Nashville. During his tenure at Belmont, he began taking students out on tour with The Turtles and the Happy Together Tours where they got hands-on experience while serving as the production and road crew.
Both Volman and Kaylan had their share of health troubles in the 2010s. Mark was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2015, received treatment, and was cancer free in 2016. He later reported he had Lewy body dementia but his cause of death (in September of 2025 at the age of 78) was listed as a ‘brief, sudden illness from a blood disease’. Kaylan retired from performing in 2018 due to cardiac issues but has remained active writing and posting on various media sites. Even after Howard retired, the Happy Together Tours continued with Ron Dante (the voice of The Archies records including Sugar Sugar) stepped up to fill his role with The Turtles portion of the show.
More recent HTT acts have included Gary Puckett, The Cowsills, The Association, The Vogues, Jerry Scheff (Chicago), The Troggs, and The Fortunes. Chuck Negron (Three Dog Night) was a frequent member of the tour but he also had to bow out for health reasons. By all reports, Volman was still involved in the HTT in the months before his death. In the tried and true ‘the show must go on’ tradition, Ron Dante and the rest of the Happy Together Tour groups will be on the road again in 2026. In many cases, the old groups are represented by one or two original members. The backing band for a number of years has included musicians who toured with The Alan Parsons Project when they performed at Michigan Tech University in the early 2000s (notably guitarist Godfrey Townsend, drummer Steve Murphy, and keyboard player Manny Focarazzo). Townsend and Focarazzo are still with the current HT band. The Happy Together Tour has scheduled shows in Detroit and the Wisconsin Dells among their 2026 dates listed on their web site. Even without Howard and Mark in the line up, I suspect The Turtles’ catalog will be well represented.
Top Piece Video: Happy Together from The Midnight Special circa 1976 – note the billing as The Turtles with Flo & Eddie!