Flowers was born in
Isleworth,
Middlesex, England, on 19 May 1938. He began his musical training in 1956 when conscripted into the
Royal Air Force, electing at first to serve for nine years as a bandsman playing
tuba. He took up
double bass as a second instrument to secure his "
Junior Technician" stripe and later moved to
bass guitar. After completing his military service he passed through the line-ups of several
Dixieland jazz bands in the early 1960s, then discovered
modern jazz. In 1965 he was engaged as a bandsman on the ocean liner
Queen Elizabeth. After hearing an electric bass at a New York nightclub, he acquired his own solid-body electric instrument, Later in the 1960s, Flowers began to acquire his reputation as a session player, working for record producers such as
Shel Talmy,
Mickie Most,
Steve Rowland,
Richard Perry,
Gus Dudgeon and
Tony Visconti. In 1969 Flowers was a founding member of the group
Blue Mink, playing on their song "
Melting Pot" which reached No. 3 in the
UK singles chart, he came up with it after following an easy primer book on composing. All he needed was a hook, and he was struggling to come up with anything. He telephoned a friend, Ken Pickett, who came round, ringing the doorbell, and the sound of the doorbell provided the hook he needed. Perhaps Flowers's most famous
bassline is the one he created for
Lou Reed's "
Walk on the Wild Side" from the album
Transformer (1972), consisting of two overdubbed simultaneous ascending and descending
portamento notes, resulting in physically "impossible"
double stops. it reached No 10 on the
UK singles chart and was certified Platinum by the
BPI. In an interview on
BBC TV, Flowers said that he did this because it helped the bassline "take on a new character" because "that's what old jazzers do". It also meant he got paid a double fee for the recording. Flowers's bass hook was performed on
double bass overlaid by
fretless Fender Jazz Bass. He was paid a
£17 flat fee (). He played and recorded with
Marc Bolan from late 1976 until Bolan's death, in September 1977, and also appeared with him on the
Marc television series in 1977. In 1998 session drummer Peter Boita again teamed up with Flowers to form a rhythm section in musical settings of the words of poet Sir
John Betjeman on a second album they recorded together. The album was called
Betjeman & Read. They had previously worked together on the
Poetry in Motion album (released on Silhouette Records as MDKR 1), which also consisted of settings of Betjeman's
It featuring Boita and Flowers playing with a line-up of artists that included
David Essex,
Justin Hayward,
Steve Harley,
Donovan,
Alvin Stardust,
Captain Sensible and
Annie Haslam amongst others, with Beatles' producer
George Martin overseeing proceedings. Boita and Flowers reprised their roles when
Poetry in Motion was performed live for a charity show at the Richmond Theatre on 5 April 1992.
Betjeman & Read was one of the last albums recorded at the
RG Jones in
Wimbledon. The vocal artists performing on this album include
Cliff Richard,
Marc Almond,
Paul Young,
Jon Anderson,
Colin Blunstone,
Gene Pitney,
Leo Sayer, Donovan,
Mike Read, the
Rodolfus Choir and David Essex. Over the course of his career Flowers contributed to recordings by Elton John (
Tumbleweed Connection,
Madman Across the Water), Camel (tuba on
Nude), David Bowie (
Space Oddity,
Diamond Dogs), Lou Reed (
Transformer, including the two prominent basslines of
"Walk on the Wild Side"), Melanie (
Candles in the Rain), Roy Harper (
Bullinamingvase), David Essex (
Rock On), Al Kooper (''
New York City (You're a Woman)), Bryan Ferry (The Bride Stripped Bare), Harry Nilsson (Nilsson Schmilsson, Son of Schmilsson), Cat Stevens (New Masters, Foreigner), Paul McCartney (Give My Regards to Broad Street), George Harrison (Somewhere in England, Gone Troppo, Brainwashed) and Ringo Starr (Stop and Smell the Roses). He also played bass on Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds''. By the end of the 1970s, Flowers had played bass on an estimated 500 hit recordings.
"Rock On" In 1973 English singer
David Essex released "
Rock On" as a single and it rapidly became an international hit. The distinctive strippedback musical arrangement was devised by producer
Jeff Wayne. According to Wayne, only three session musicians played on the final backing track, and the most prominently featured was Flowers, whose doubletracked bass guitar was treated with a prominent "
slapback" delay effect, creating a complex
polyrhythmic backbeat: :"I can recall the three musicians on the backing track for 'Rock On' all looking around in a mostly empty
Advision Studios, Studio 1, wanting to know when the rest of the band were arriving! I explained there weren't any others for that track, and I was relying on them to understand my idea for the production. While the drums and percussion parts were written out, it was definitely Herbie that grasped immediately that a bass guitar playing a lead riff could fill a large part of the spatial spectrum and he took my idea and turned some basic notes of mine, into his amazing bass riff. Then to top it off, he suggested playing it again an octave higher. So you get this unusual bass sound right up front – now it couldn't have been up front if the arrangement didn't allow the air and the space to be created that way". Flowers himself noted that, as a reward for devising the double-tracked bassline, he was paid double his normal session fee, and thus received £24 instead of the usual £12. == Personal life ==