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King of Hits
Home arrow Biography
Biography PDF Print E-mail
Monday, 16 January 2006
A brief synopsis of JK's career.

Please go to the LITERARY section for a more detailed description of his first autobiography, published in December 2009, entitled 65 My Life So Far. For a mere few pennies you can even purchase it. Packed with photos and anecdotes telling you more than you ever wanted to know. And with quite a few pictures and cuttings from newspapers in case you need to be convinced about many of the extraordinary events in his life.

Although the 500 printed copies have all sold out, high quality used copies are available through Amazon.

And we were No 1 on their Kindle pop culture chart. Rather than print paperbacks, we've gone E Book and they are flying out! If E books can fly. We strongly suggest, if you're interested in JK, you download a Kindle copy.

The Second Season of his Autobiography, 70 FFFY, was published on December 6th 2014.

That has also been No1 on the Amazon/Kindle chart. It updates, fills in gaps and provides some horrifying gossip. If you are genuinely interested, we suggest you read both.

JK's official Biography... A lot has been left out here for space reasons!

Jonathan King was born Kenneth George King in London on December 6th 1944, of an American father and British mother. The family moved to Surrey when he was very young and he spent most of his early life near Dorking, in Brookhurst Grange, Ewhurst and Cobbetts, Forest Green. He was sent to Stoke House prep school (boarding) and Charterhouse public school.

His father Jimmy King won an OBE for bravery in the Second World War and died when JK was 9 in June 1954; his beloved mother Ailsa brought up all three brothers and died peacefully on August 24th 2007 aged 91.

He passed into Trinity College Cambridge and, before starting his studies, travelled for six months around the world, attempting to make contacts in the music industry. He met Derek Taylor, Brian Epstein, Peter Asher, Tommy Lipuma and others including, when he got home, Joe Meek. He managed to write some songs, record some tracks, produce a group and even get product released, but his first success came in 1965, when, as a Cambridge undergraduate, he wrote & sang his first hit, Everyone's Gone To The Moon. It sold 4.5 million copies around the world. He remained at college but, instead of trying to become a pop star, became one of the first independent record producers, writing and producing other hits - such as It's Good News Week by Hedgehoppers Anonymous, which was an immediate Top Five hit, and discovering, producing and naming GENESIS, a school band at Charterhouse, with Peter Gabriel as lead singer.

On finishing Cambridge, he wrote and fronted his own TV series, Good Evening I'm Jonathan King, running on ITV nationally in the UK on Saturday evenings for 26 weeks, at prime time. He also ran DECCA RECORDS for his friend the founder, Sir Edward Lewis, who had also been to Trinity, in the late '60s and, as a result, was offered the chairmanship of several large music corporations, which he turned down.

In 1971, 1972 & 1973 he was acclaimed as the Producer of the Year. You can see photos of his awards in his books. He had several big hits under many different names, often two or three smashes at the same time. Unlike rumours to the contrary, and wrongly reproduced from inaccurate cuttings ever since, he never had 20 hits in the Top 40 simultaneously but it might have seemed like that, as many were under pseudonyms and rumours went around that he was, in reality, both Tom Jones and Shirley Bassey.

He produced The Bay City Rollers and sang most of the backing vocals on their first hit, Keep On Dancing. He funded, and produced the original soundtrack recording of, The Rocky Horror Show. In the '70s he was one of the most famous and successful British pop personalities and producers. He formed his own label, UK Records, and had hits on it with 10cc (who he named) and others. In 1975 he won the Record of the Year Ivor Novello Award for his own rendition of Una Paloma Blanca, although proof of this is hard to find as the dancing lady statuette was stolen from his house. He ran Decca again as a favour for Sir Edward, before Lewis sold it to Polygram in the late '70s. Polygram boss David Fine then offered him the Chairmanship of their entire global music division, which, again, he declined.

He went to New York to write a novel (Bible Two) and had his own daily radio show on top news station WMCA from 10-12 every weekday in 1980. Fifteen years earlier he had been Number One on their Good Guys survey but the pop music station had changed format to all talk. He started doing regular reports from the States on Top of the Pops in the early '80s and that developed into Entertainment USA, one of the most popular series on BBC2 in the '80s, reaching over nine million viewers weekly.

He created and produced No Limits which also gained massive ratings of nearly six million and was #1 on the channel ratings chart. He wrote a column in The Sun for eight years in the '80s, the Bizarre USA page, and he holds the record for the biggest mailbag ever, after his column about Live Aid in 1985. In 1987 he wrote & hosted The Brits for the BBC. It was acclaimed as the best Brits ever. He invented the name The Brits for that year's show... it was an acronym for British Record Industry Trusts Show.

By the '90s he was starting to concentrate more on behind the scenes roles. In 1990, 1991 and 1992 he also wrote & produced The Brits, taking over after the disastrous previous year (Mick Fleetwood and Sam Fox plus a load of mistakes) making hundreds of thousands for the Nordof Robbins industry charity.

But he resigned from that and in 1995 he took over A Song For Europe, the BBC quest for a British Eurovision winner. His 1996 entry Just A Little Bit by Gina G was a huge global hit but only reached 8th in Eurovision. But he then won the contest for the UK in 1997 with Katrina and the Waves, Love Shine A Light, making millions for tourism when the UK hosted the event in 1998 in Birmingham. He was also responsible for the Record of the Year show - a spectacular TV success just before Christmas every year, getting nearly 10 million viewers on ITV when it started in the 90's and often topping the ratings. In December 2005 the Record of the Year Show got almost twice as many viewers as the 2006 Brits and the sales boost just before Christmas 2005 was far greater than the minor improvement the following February.

He formed The Tip Sheet in 1993. It was the most respected music weekly publication in the world, promoting such future hits as Chumbawamba's Tubthumping and Who Let The Dogs Out, as well as championing artistes like The Corrs and Eva Cassidy, whilst they were unsigned or unknown. In fact, JK recorded the original, finished studio version of Who Let The Dogs Out under the pseudonym Fat Jakk And His Pack Of Pets. He was also involved in the Cuban Boys' hit translation of The Hamster Dance Song - Cognoscenti Vs Intelligentsia - which went into the Christmas Top Five in 1999 and topped John Peel's Festive Fifty that year.

He's written regular features in many other newspapers and magazines on numerous topics from music to social issues & for the travel section of The Mail On Sunday. He's had two novels published; the aforementioned WHAllen/Star Bible Two & The Booker Prize Winner. In Oct 1997 the British Music Industry made JONATHAN KING The Man of the Year and he was feted at a wildly successful dinner at The Grosvenor House Hotel. Other recent recipients have included Beatles producer George Martin, Peter Gabriel, Simon Cowell and Bond man John Barry. Amongst those praising JK to the skies were the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair.

He was asked by Eric Nicoli to become Global Chairman of EMI, the music corporation, in 2000 and wonders whether, had he accepted, the company might still be British, might have signed such artistes as Adele and One Direction through his connections to executives behind them, and might still, to this day, be making billions for the Treasury. We shall never know.

In late 2000, however, everything took on an interesting new aspect. JK was arrested over claims of sexual abuse going back to the late 60's and early 70's. He assumed these false allegations would be discarded as ridiculous. But they provoked other accusations and he was eventually charged, tried and wrongly convicted of 6 crimes against five middle aged men who said they were 14 and 15 at the time, in the 1980's. At the time of writing he is still battling to have those convictions overturned by the Appeal courts. Several other celebrities have since discovered how easy it is to have had allegations, false or otherwise, against them. Media publicity provokes claims of every kind. The False Allegations Industry has flourished, often against dead celebrities, ruining lives and careers. JK continues to fight against it.

And in 2007 the European Court of Human Rights accepted his submission that, by changing the dates on the charges after his defence had been completed, his conviction was unsafe. The Court considered his evidence but rejected his appeal on a technicality.

He spent three and a half years of his seven year sentence in Her Majesty's Prison Estate, at Belmarsh, Elmley and Maidstone. He was released in 2005 on parole and emerged smiling, happy and positive, which infuriated most people, who felt he should have expressed remorse for crimes he had not committed and misery after incarceration which, in fact, he had greatly enjoyed.

He found prison a fascinating and revealing experience, enabling him to help many lost souls and comfort many distressed individuals. Just because the parameters had changed, there was no reason to alter his positive attitude towards life.

He still writes a regular column in Inside Time, the newspaper for prisoners - sent free to all jails. With over 200,000 monthly readers, it is a powerful publication.

And he continues to enjoy the daily excitements of his current existence. His successes and influence roll onwards... the Tipsheet message board picked up on a band from Hollywood that had been around for years without getting signed - ORSON - and they were immediately adopted by Universal Music and Mercury Records as a direct result. His associate company Bocu publishes Abba and Madonna's use of their Gimme Gimme Gimme in a sample gave her a huge comeback hit single with HUNG UP. His proteges, friends and ex employees were behind NIZLOPI and adopted JK's "Xmas chart topper" formula that he'd used for The Cuban Boys to acquire their hit The JCB Song. Viewers of TV commercials hear songs like Let It All Hang Out (Fosters Twist Lager) and Time Of The Season (Magners Cider) every day.

Mamma Mia was a smash stage musical and became a smash film with Abba's songs.

His advice helped You Tuber Alex Day get an unsigned No4 Christmas hit in 2011 with Forever Yours, the first time an iTunes, unpublished, unmanaged, non label performer made the UK Top 5.

On Wednesday 25th January 2012 he appeared in front of the Leveson Inquiry, talking about the relationship between the police and the media, examining how police often use the media to create and construct cases, sometimes involving false allegations. He was denied the opportunity to be considered a "core participant", as it was not on the Inquiry agenda. His appearance can be seen in the afternoon session of the Inquiry's daily video.

He celebrated his 73rd birthday on the 6th December 2017 and would like you to know, if you're interested, that some of his AUTOBIOG VIDEO BLOGS can be seen in the Deep Throat area of this site (the first 30 of 100) and the full 100 are available on DVD/Quick Time Movies in his Earth To King collection, released in 2007 and selling dozens every month. It is available through Amazon.

His autobiography published in 2009, 65 My Life So Far, is also still available from Amazon and a few good book stores for a mere £20 - and says all this, at much greater length, and a lot, lot more, some of it quite surprising. The E Book version has been No1 on the Amazon Kindle pop culture chart.

And the Second Season of his autobiography, 70 FFFY - was published on 6th December 2014, bringing it up to date and enlarging on several of the incidents from earlier in his life, such as the recording of Hooked On A Feeling in 1971, after the song was used in the soundtrack of the top movie Guardians of the Galaxy and his Ooga Chagga hook featured in the trailer for the film.

He wrote and published another novel under the pseudonym Rex Kenny - Beware The Monkey Man - available through Amazon. It very nearly made the Booker Prize list but, when it didn't, Private Eye revealed it was in fact by JK and suddenly the hardback started selling.

In 2013 he published a new novel under the name Kenneth George King - Death Flies, Missing Girls and Brigitte Bardot. Both these and other novels can be bought as paper and Kindle books.

He made a 96 minute movie, Vile Pervert: The Musical, which included 21 of his songs, and was placed online at www.VilePervert.com for anyone to watch or download for free. Within months it had thousands of full length views and recently topped two million online views. He played all the characters. It entertains and informs.

He wrote and produced his second movie Me Me Me - which was released in May 2011. It is also available to be watched and/or downloaded for free on www.MeMeMeMovie.com. It received mixed reviews ranging from adoration to hatred. It was screened in a well attended Leicester Square Premiere and also had popular screenings in Dusseldorf during Eurovision and at the Cannes Film Festival.

In 2013 he released a third movie - The Pink Marble Egg - which was likewise screened at the Cannes Film Festival and was positively reviewed. It can be seen for free at www.PinkMarbleEgg.com

And he put out a 60 minute follow up to his first film - Vile Pervert: The Sequel - which looked at events since that movie and also explained how to make a hit in the second decade of the century - or not, as the case may be. www.VilePervert.com

He wrote a diary whilst filming sequences for The Pink Marble Egg around Europe and North Africa. Three Months is also available as a paperback or E-Book through Amazon.

On August 7th 2015 an article by JK about Sir Edward Heath and the False Allegations Industry was published in The Spectator. This was the first time in 15 years a traditional, mainstream publication had carried his writing and it provoked a storm of protest and had major ramifications.

In May 2016 the writer Bob Woffinden published his book The Nicholas Cases, looking at the ten worst miscarriages of justice in the UK from the previous 30 years. JK's case was one of them.

JK has applied once again to the Criminal Case Review Commission citing this and further fresh evidence that his Appeal for those convictions should be granted. Likewise, after further developments concerning his wrongful arrest, home search and Operation Ravine on September 9th 2015, he has made a formal complaint to the IPCC - the Independent Police Complaints Commission - regarding the behaviour of Surrey Police which, he suspects, may have lead directly to the deaths of three innocent men, Laurence Pollinger (56), Robert Randall (79) and Deniz Corday (87). Meanwhile Surrey Police and the CPS continued their attempted third prosecution on claims of historical abuse.

After nearly three years, the entire Surrey Police case against Jonathan was thrown out. He was declared NOT GUILTY of several counts and the rest were ordered abandoned by HHJ Taylor at Southwark Crown Court on August 6th 2018. First trial - wrongly convicted (and his Appeal is ongoing, 18 years later). Second trial - Not Guilty on all counts. Third trial - collapsed after he was found Not Guilty again. Fourth trial (retrial) refused. Goodness me; they do know the meaning of the word "vindictive".

But JK is not giving up - he owes it to the many innocent men and women jailed through frankly disgraceful police and CPS behaviour. And the many more dead (some suicides; some stress related) such as his three friends above. Watch him fight. And, if you can, help him. Your voice counts.

And his story of the 2018 "debacle" - HHJ Taylor's word for the Surrey Police/CPS attempt to destroy him for a second time - can be read in detail in GUILTY, available as paperback and Kindle on Amazon.

In late 2019 he completed and released his film GUILTY and in the first week of free online presence it got over 30,000 Full Length views. One of the songs in it has been accepted as a possible Best Oscar entry. It can be seen on the www.VilePervert.com site but also on YouTube, Vimeo and dozens of other internet sites.

And on its own site www.GuiltyMovie.com

Since the 2018 "debacle", an independent examination of Operation Ravine by Hydrant looked at 5% of his complaints (anything involving individual officers could not be investigated by Hydrant as Surrey Police's Professional Standards Department were examining them) and found numerous faults, making 27 serious recommendations to Surrey Police. The PSD report eventually came out in 2020, likewise finding several flaws and suggesting disciplinary action. But all the most serious complaints were brushed under a carpet. So JK appealed to the IOPC (which had taken over from the IPCC) which UPHELD his complaint that the PSD investigation had been incompetent, either accidentally or deliberately. As 2021 begins, this is just the beginning.

As a result the Metropolitan Police have removed him from the Sex Offenders Register. He published a short book - Not A Knee On The Neck (how British police kill people) which can be purchased through Amazon and others and has caused quite a storm.

At the same time the CCRC has re-opened an examination into his wrongful 2001 conviction due to a load of fresh evidence emerging during the 2018 trial, much of which was failure to disclose vital evidence in 2001. JK hopes this year that his convictions will be declared unsafe by the Court of Appeal and his reputation restored.