Eden Kane - Life and Career

Life and Career

Like Cliff Richard, Pete Best, and Engelbert Humperdinck, Eden Kane was born in India, but returned to Britain as a child. He first created some interest for his talent with an advertising jingle for Cadbury's, called "Hot Chocolate Crazy", issued as a single by Pye Records. This was played almost as often as Horace Batchelor's football pools advertisement on Radio Luxembourg.

This was quickly followed in 1961 by his only number one hit in the UK Singles Chart, "Well I Ask You", on Decca. The song was written by Les Vandyke and arranged by John Keating. Vandyke had earlier worked on two chart-topping singles for Adam Faith, ("What Do You Want" and "Poor Me"). The further quirky connection is that both artist's stage names owed more than a little of their originality to Genesis, Chapter One.

Success continued with three further Top10 hits during the next twelve months. However, a couple of flops, financial problems, and a change in label to Philips subsidiary Fontana marked a decline similar to that experienced by most of the pre-Beatles UK stars. Like many of his teen idol peers, Kane sought to stave off chart oblivion by hitching a ride onto the beat boom bandwagon, teaming with a group with real Liverpool pedigree - Fontana labelmates Earl Preston and the TT's. This energetic attempt, originally titled "Do You Love Me" (c/w "Comeback") was reissued with a new title "Like I Love You", to avoid confusion with the UK hit covers by Brian Poole & the Tremeloes and the Dave Clark Five of The Contours' U.S. hit of the same name, and some momentum was lost.

Kane's next release, a UK and Australia Top 10 comeback hit with "Boys Cry" in 1964, was just a hiccup on the general downward spiral and did little to sustain his career. However, he was arguably the last British solo star to succeed before the arrival of the Beatles, and his five chart singles all made the Top Ten. After "Well I Ask You" made No 1 in June 1961, "Get Lost" reached No 10 in September 1961; "Forget Me Not" achieved No 3 spot in January 1962. Both of these were also written by Les Vandyke. "I Don't Know Why" reached No 7 in May 1962, and finally "Boys Cry" made No 8 in January 1964.

Kane later moved to America and married journalist Charlene Groman (the sister of actress Stefanie Powers), whom he had first met while passing through the United States in the mid 1960s. He remained active in the entertainment business in the States, as a record producer.

The family was far from finished. His brother, Peter Sarstedt, got to number one himself in 1969, with "Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)"; whilst the youngest brother Clive, who had earlier recorded under the supervision of Joe Meek as Wes Sands, later used his middle name to call himself Robin Sarstedt and reached the British Top 3 in 1976 with his cover rendition of the old Hoagy Carmichael song, "My Resistance Is Low".

As a footnote, in the mid 1970s all three brothers sang together briefly, but this did not create new chart action for Kane. On 20 June 1973, the brothers made their first joint appearance as a group at Croydon's Fairfield Halls. Eden, Peter and Robin went on to win a joint BASCA Award for composing and songwriting. Eden has recorded for Decca, Fontana, Bell, Monarch, HMV and Festival (the last two being Australian releases).

As of 2006, all three of the Sarstedt brothers are still active in the music industry and Eden has toured the UK several times with the 'Solid Gold Rock and Roll' tours.

Kane was a contract actor on the Star Trek team, and made many appearances in the TV series under his real name Richard Sarstedt.

Currently he has a CD, entitled Y2Kane, available on his website.