#2: I Only Have Eyes For You by the Flamingos

City: Saint John, NB
Radio Station: CFBC
Peak Month: July 1959
Peak Position Saint John ~ #1
Peak position in Vancouver ~ #21
Peak Position on Billboard Hot 100 ~ #11
YouTube: “I Only Have Eyes For You”
Lyrics: “I Only Have Eyes For You”

The Flamingos were an R&B doo-wop group that formed in Chicago in 1953. John E. Carter was one of the founding members of the group that was first named The Swallows. In 1952, Jacob “Jake” Carey and Ezekiel “Zeke” Carey were looking to form a group in Chicago. They happened to meet with their cousins Paul Wilson and Johnny Carter at the Hebrew Israelite congregation. By 1953 the group came together and after a few lineup changes Sollie McElroy was added. They became popular at house parties and some small clubs. They appeared at a local Chicago talent show named Martin’s Corner. Winning the talent show, they became part of the regular billing for awhile. The Flamingos’ first single was with Chance Records titled “If I Can’t Have You”, was a moderate local success, as was the follow-up “That’s My Desire”. But it was Johnny Carter’s composition of “Golden Teardrops”, with its complex vocal harmonies and Carter’s soaring falsetto, that cemented their reputation as a top regional act of the day. 

The record that got the attention of several big band leaders was “Golden Teardrops”

Subsequently, The Flamingos toured with Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton and Woody Herman’s orchestras. They had their first television appearance in the summer of 1954. As well, they performed at the Black Orchid in Chicago, The Flame in Minneapolis, and the Rivera in St. Louis.

The Flamingos left Chance Records sometime after their December 1953 session, and signed with Parrot Records. Sollie McElroy was on their first Parrot session, but left the group in December 1954. Several in the group expected to the drafted, and so they added tenor Nate Nelson, who had been discharged from the United States Navy. A cousin of The Orioles lead singer, Sonny Till, Nate Nelson added much to the Flamingos sound.

The Flamingos were appearing at venues like The Apollo in Harlem. They shared the stage with Bo Diddley, Bill Doggett, the Jacks, the Heartbeats, the Harptones, Howlin’ Wolf, Etta James, and the Willis “Gator Tail” Jackson Orchestra. In late 1955, The Flamingos appeared at the Brooklyn Paramount. Also on the bill were the Turbans, Shirley & Lee, the 5 Keys, Ruth Brown, the Cheers, Bo Diddley, Willis Jackson, and Pat Boone. Sadly for the Flamingos, this is when Boone heard them sing the recorded (Oct0ber 1955) but-as-yet-unreleased “I’ll Be Home”.

In early 1956, “I’ll Be Home” peaked on the R&B chart at #5. Meanwhile, in December 1955, Pat Boone covered “I’ll Be Home” which reached #5 on the pop charts in the USA, and climbed to #1 in the UK for five weeks beginning on June 6/56.

In 1956, The Flamingos appeared on stage alongside Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, the Platters, the Willows, the Rover Boys, the Cleftones, the Jodimars, the Royaltones, the Drifters, Bill Haley and the Comets, the Platters, Clyde McPhatter, Lavern Baker, the Teen Queens, Bo Diddley, Joe Turner, the Colts, and the Red Prysock Orchestra, Ray Charles, Chuck Willis, The Dells and others. In the summer of 1956, “A Kiss From Your Lips” reached #12 on the Billboard R&B chart.

Later in 1956, The Flamingos appeared in the film Rock, Rock, Rock, which opened in early December. The group appeared in the film alongside Chuck Berry, Alan Freed, the Moonglows, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, and Connie Francis. They also were billed at The Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas for a time.

In 1957 The Flamingos consisted of

Zeke Carey and John Carter were drafted into the United States Army in 1956. They were replaced by Tommy Hunt and Terry Johnson. They travelled to many clubs, including the Club Chaudiere in Hull, Quebec. When Zeke Carey was discharged from the US Army in 1958, he rejoined the group. (When Johnny Carter got out of the army he joined The Dells).

In 1957, The Flamingos appeared on stage alongside Mickey & Sylvia, the Drifters, Chuck Willis, the Teenchords, Big Maybelle, Steve Gibson’s Red Caps, Little Joe and the Thrillers, and Solomon Burke. “The Ladder Of Love” was a minor hit in Canada that year.

In 1958, The Flamingos appeared in concert with the Coasters, Fats Domino, the Dells, the Spaniels, Bob & Earl, Bobby Day, Big Maybelle, the Bobbettes, the Five Keys, and the Hollywood Flames.

In 1959, the lineup for The Flamingos consisted of original members Jake Carey, Zeke Carey, and Paul Wilson, along with Nate Nelson, Tommy Hunt and Terry Johnson. It was Nate Nelson who provided falsetto vocals for The Flamingos most notable hits.

They performed at The Apollo in mid-January 1959, alongside Jerry Butler, the Crests, Little Anthony and the Imperials, the Quin-Tones, Wade Flemons, Doc Bagby, and comedian Clay Tyson. Later in the year they appeared alongside the Fiestas, Chubby Checker, Jessie Belvin, Dee Clark, the Drifters, Jerry Butler, Five Satins, Little Anthony and The Imperials, the Clovers, Al Hibbler, the Isley Brothers, Carmen McRae and Pigmeat Markham.

In 1959, The Flamingos released an album titled Flamingo Serenade. One of the tracks was “I Only Have Eyes For You”.

“I Only Have Eyes For You” was written by Harry Warren. His birth name was Salvatore Antonio Guaragna, and he was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1893. He was one of eleven children and his father (a bookmaker by trade) changed the family surname when Salvatore was a child. He learned to play his father’s accordion, and also sang in a church choir and learned to play the drums. He began to play the drums professionally by age 14. Salvatore dropped out of high school at 16 to play with his godfather’s band in a traveling carnival. Soon he taught himself to play the piano. By 1915, he was working at the Vitagraph Motion Picture Studios, where he did a variety of administrative jobs, such as props man. He also played mood music on the piano for the actors, acted in bit parts and eventually was an assistant director. He also played the piano in cafés and silent-movie houses. In 1918 he joined the United States Navy, where he began writing songs.

Harry Warren (1920)

Warren wrote over 800 songs between 1918 and 1981, publishing over 500 of them. They were written mainly for 56 feature films. However, his songs have appeared in over three hundred films, and 112 LooneyTunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons released by Warner Bros. Forty-two of his songs were on the top ten list of the radio program Your Hit Parade, the popular variety show that ran from 1950 to 1959 on radio and television. The show was a measure of a song’s popularity. Twenty-one of Warren’s songs reached number-one on Your Hit Parade. Harry Warren was the director of ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers) from 1929 to 1932.

Harry Warren’s first commercial success was with a number-three charting song by Marion Harris in 1923 titled “Rose of the Rio Grande”. He wrote other Top Ten hits in the 1920s for Fred Waring’s Pennsylvanians (“I Love My Baby” and “Where Do You Work-A John?”), Gene Austin (“You Gotta Know How To Love”), Ted Lewis & his Band (“One Sweet Letter From You”), George Olsen and His Orchestra (“Old Man Sunshine, Little Boy Bluebird”), Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians, and the Iyana Troubadors (“Nagasaki”). In 1930 “Crying For the Carolines” reached #3 for Fred Waring’s Pennsylvanians, as did “Have a Little Faith in Me” for Guy Lombardo.

Harry Warren’s first chart-topping songs were in 1931 with “By the River St. Marie” for Guy Lombardo, and “I Found A Million Dollar Baby” for Fred Waring’s Pennsylvanians. In 1933, his fourth number-one hit was “Forty-Second Street” by Don Bestor. Other number-one hits he wrote in the 1930s include “I’ll String Along With You” for Ted Fio Rito & His Orchestra, “Lullaby of Broadway” for the Dorsey Brothers, “She’s A Latin from Manhattan” for Victor Young, “I’ll Sing You A Thousand Love Songs” for Eddy Duchin, “September In the Rain” for Guy Lombardo, “Remember Me” (which won an Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1937) and “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby” for Bing Crosby, “Jeepers Creepers” for Al Donahue and His Orchestra, and “With Plenty of Money and You” for Henry Busse and His Orchestra.

In the 1940s, Harry Warren penned the chart-topping hits “Chattanooga Choo Choo” and “I’ve Got A Gal in Kalamazoo” for Glenn Miller and His Orchestra, “I Had the Craziest Dream” for Harry James and His Orchestra, “You’ll Never Know” for Dick Haymes (which won an Academy Award in 1943 for Best Original Song as sung by Frank Sinatra), “My Heart Tells Me” for Glen Gray and his Casa Loma Orchestra, and “On the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe” for Johnny Mercer (which won and Academy Award in 1946 for Best Original Song as sung by Judy Garland).

Harry Warren also wrote “We’re In the Money”, “At Last”, “Serenade In Blue”, “That’s Amore”, You’re Getting To Be a Habit”, “Shuffle Off to Buffalo”, “Would You Like to Take a Walk”, “About A Quarter to Nine”, “Honeymoon Hotel”, and many others. In 1981, Harry Warren died at the age of 87.

“I Only Have Eyes For You” was first recorded by Jane Froman and charted to #20 in 1934. Subsequently, Eddy Duchin and His Orchestra took the song to #4 later that year. The Flamingos 1959 arrangement features an intricate layering of vocal harmonies. The Flamingos’ voices weave together seamlessly, creating a lush, choir-like effect. The “shoo-bop shoo-bop” refrain is hypnotic. It acts as both a rhythmic and melodic anchor for the track.

In The Flamingos rendition of “I Only Have Eyes For You” they dropped half of the introductory lines to the pop standard. In 1934, the opening verse in the 1934 recordings began with these lines:

My love must be a kind of blind love,
I can’t see anyone but you.
And dear I wonder if you find love,
an optical illusion too.

The Flamingos appeared on Dick Clark’s Saturday Night Beechnut Show on July 11, 1959. On the broadcast they sang “I Only Have Eyes For You” appearing in a wintery snow-covered night skit with a few logs on an outdoor campfire. Nate Nelson warmed his hands by the fire and then stood up to sing the lead vocals (lip-synched as was the custom).

“I Only Have Eyes For You” peaked at #1 in Saint John (NB), Buffalo, Arlington (VA), Fairfax (VA), Pittsburgh, #2 in San Francisco, Bellingham (WA), and Rockville (MD), #3 in Nashville, Denver, Pawtucket (RI), Columbus (OH), San Diego, and Colorado Springs (CO), #4 in Burlington (VT), Providence (RI), Minneapolis/St. Paul, and Norfolk (VA), #5 in Washington DC, Chicago, New York City and Los Angeles, #6 in Wheaton (MD), San Bernardino (CA), and Renton (WA), #7 in Boston, Toronto, Ell Cajon (CA), and Wausau (WI), #8 in Fresno (CA), Milwaukee (WI), Newport News (VA), Rockford (IL), and Seattle, #9 in Albany (NY), Philadelphia, Wichita (KS), Winnipeg (MB), and Great Falls (MT), and #10 in Troy (NY), Fort Dodge (IA), and Montreal.

“I Only Have Eyes For You” is listed in the list of the 25 most-performed songs of the 20th Century, as compiled by the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers. The song has been recorded by Cliff Richard, The Lettermen, Jerry Butler, Mel Carter, Art Garfunkel, Johnny Mathis, the Main Ingredient, Hugo Winterhalter, Freddy Gardner, Harry Connick Jr., Jackie Gleason, The Swallows, Billie Holiday, Jo Stafford, Ambrose & His Orchestra, The Ray Conniff Singers, Coleman Hawkins, Doris Day, Rod Stewart, Paul Weston and His Orchestra, George Shearing Trio, Erroll Garner, Al Jolson, Billy Eckstine, Steve Lawrence, Stan Getz Quartet, Edna McGriff with Sonny Til and the Orioles, Cleo Laine, Lionel Hampton Trio, Monica Lewis, Billy Vaughn, Kenny Rogers, Tony Bennett, Oscar Peterson, Michael Bublé, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Frankie Carle and His Rhythm, Vicki Carr, Lloyd Price, Mary Wells, Peggy Lee, George Benson, Carmen McRae, Percy Faith Orchestra, André Previn, Joe Williams, Ralph Marterie and His Orchestra, Billy Paul, Charlie Byrd, Carly Simon, Spike Jones, Jermaine Jackson, Rosemary Clooney with Perez Prado, Eddie Floyd, Betty Carter, Ferrante & Teicher, Ivo Robic, James Last, Holly Cole, Etta James, Santo & Johnny, Eddie Fisher, Patti Page, Les Brown and his band of renown, Dinah Shore, Mitzi Gaynor, Paul Anka, Roy Eldridge, Benny Goodman, Joni James, Frank Chacksfield & His Orchestra, Elaine Paige, Tommy Sands, Joe Loco and His Quintet, The Ames Brothers, Jason Donovan, The Platters, and many others.

Later in 1959, coming off the success of “I Only Have Eyes For You”, The Flamingos appeared in the film Go Johnny Go. They sang “Jump Children” in the teen flick.

A followup single, “Love Walked In” was another track from Flamingo Serenade. But it stalled at #88 on the Billboard Hot 100. They ended the year with “Lovers Never Say Goodbye”, a non-album track that reached #25 on the R&B chart, and #52 on the Hot 100. In 1960, The Flamingos began appearing in concert alongside Johnny Nash, Nappy Brown, the Hollywood Flames, Eugene Church, Barrett Strong, Jimmy Jones, Marv Johnson and others.

The group released “I Was Such a Fool (To Fall in Love with You)” in the winter of 1959-60, and reached #71 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was covered by Connie Francis in 1962 and was a Top 30 hit for her. This was followed by “Mio Amore” which peaked at #74 on the Hot 100, and #27 on the Billboard R&B chart. The Flamingos had their biggest hit in 1960 titled “Nobody Loves Me Like You” which peaked at #30 on the Billboard Hot 100, and #23 on the R&B chart. A fourth single, “Your Other Love”, stalled at #54 on the Hot 100.

At the start of 1961, Nate Nelson’s lead vocal on the Flamingos’ cover of “Kokomo” – Perry Como’s #2 hit in 1955 – cracked the Billboard Hot 100 at #92. Next up, “Time Was” reached #45 on the Hot 100.

Tommy Hunt went solo and recorded “Human”. Between July and December 1961, it was a hit in New York City, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Denver, Trenton (NJ), Charleston (WV), Montreal, Fairfax (VA), Tucson (AZ), and several dozen other cities. Hunt released “The Door Is Open” in early 1962, and it charted in Hamilton (ON) and Montreal. And “I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself” was a minor hit in Windsor (ON).

By April 1961, Nate Nelson and Terry Johnson formed a rival group called the Modern Flamingos. What remained in the Flamingos struggled on. In the spring of 1964 the Flamingos returned to Checker Records for a few sides. They recorded a compelling Latin-rhythmed version of Oscar Hammerstein’s “Lover Come Back to Me”. However, in the middle of the British Invasion, the single got passed over. Shortly after Paul Wilson left.

From 1964 to 1982, Nate Nelson became a member of the Platters singing “Only You”, “The Great Pretender”, “Twilight Time”, “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes”, and more of their greatest hits.

In 1965, The Flamingos signed with Phillips Records and released a funk/doo wop version of Bing Crosby’s 1934 (number three) hit “Temptation.” The Flamingos’ final charting song in 1970 with an ode to the black cavalry soldiers of the 1880s titled “Buffalo Soldier”.

Nate Nelson died from heart failure in 1984, at the age of 52.

Paul Wilson died of undisclosed causes in 1988, at the age of 53.

In 2001, The Flamingos were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Jake Carey died in 1997, at the age of 71.

Zeke Carey died from cancer in 1999, at the age of 66.

In 2011, Rolling Stone magazine ranked “I Only Have Eyes For You” at #158 in its list of 500 Greatest Rock Songs of All Time.

Tommy Hunt died in 2025, at the age of 91.

Terry “Buzzy” Johnson died in 2025, at the age of 86.

J. C. Carey Jr., Terry Johnson, Tommy Hunt, and descendants of Nate Nelson and Paul Wilson, sued PepsiCo for having used “I Only Have Eyes For You” in a 1998 TV commercial. This was without having consulted members of The Flamingos and their descendants. The plaintiffs were awarded $250,000.

January 10, 2026
Ray McGinnis

References:
Michael Ricci, “John E. Carter R&B Tenor In Dells And Flamingos Dies,” AllAboutJazz.com, August 24, 2009.
“Zeke Carey born 24 January 1933,” From the Vaults, January 24, 2024.
Marv Goldberg interviews with Johnny Carter and Terry Johnson, “The Flamingos,” Marv Goldberg, 2006 and 2009.
Jane Froman, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Decca Records, 1934.
“Ex-Platters star Nate Nelson died Friday, one day after…,” UPI, June 1, 1984.
Robin Murray, “Soul Legend Tommy Hunt Has Died: He was 91 years old…,” February 13, 2025.
“History: Terry Johnson’s Flamingos,” December 31, 2012.
Brian Linder, “Legendary R&B singer known for iconic song dead at 86,” Patriot-News, Harrisburg (PA), October 13, 2025.
“Doo-wop Singer Zeke Carey, Dies,” Washington Post, January 1, 2000.
Freddy Gardner, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Columbia Records, 1948.
Billie Holiday, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, 1958.
Ambrose & His Orchestra, Feat. Sam Browne, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Decca Records, 1934.
Coleman Hawkins, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, 1944.
Frank Sinatra, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Columbia Records, 1943.
Erroll Garner, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Savoy Records, 1949.
Stan Getz Quartet, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Metronome Records, 1951.
Joe Williams, “I Only Have Eyes For You“, Roulette Records, 1959.

CFBC 930-AM Saint John (NB) | July 19, 1959