Jim King

Who is Jim King?

Jim King was an original member of the British rock band, Family. He played saxophone and harmonica, and sang occasional lead vocals on the band's first two albums, Music in a Doll's House and Family Entertainment. King also sang the entire lead vocal on "Observations From a Hill", a song on the latter album.

Jim, as he became known, formed James King and the Farinas, a blues based rock and roll group, with guitarist Charlie Whitney in Leicester in 1962. He sang the lead vocal on the group's single "You Better Stop" b/w "I Like it Like That". When Roger Chapman joined as vocalist in 1966 the group had begun to perform under the name The Roaring Sixties. The name Family was decided upon later. King's influence on the group's first two albums can be heard clearly with his freewheeling saxophone solos and his blues-based harmonica passages. Because he fulfilled the same role in Family as Chris Wood did in Traffic, comparisons between the two were inevitable.