Carl Worner - In his own words...

In 1975 I started recording my first song in an 8-track recording studio owned by a high school friend of mine named Ricky Kerner. He had a picture of himself posing with famous record producer Phil Ramone so I knew I was in good hands. I gave him a rough demo of my songs and he arranged, engineered, mixed and produced it with local studio musicians. All I had to do was sing on the tracks. It was one of the biggest thrills of my musical career. Others heard my singing talents and they wanted me to sing backing vocals on their recordings as well. While in the studio I met a very young and talented guitarist named Mara Fox who went on to become a member of the all female heavy metal band Precious Metal. She now is president of Rocket City Records in California. Check out her website on the Links page.

In 1977 I became a professional actor in the Broadway revival of the tribal rock musical Hair at the Biltmore Theatre in NYC. This was the second biggest thrill of my life. I was getting paid to act and stand nude on stage for a brief moment and worked with most of the original people involved in the very first Broadway production of the show when it opened in 1968. Tom O'Horgan once again directed the show and Gerry Ragni and James Rado, the creators of the musical where involved as well, revising the script and also appearing on stage as police officers arresting everyone during the nude scene. I worked with some famous actors during the short run of the show. Peter Gallagher (from The OC on the Fox network), Debrah Van Valkenburg (from the sitcom Too Close For Comfort and the movie The Warriors), Annie Golden (lead singer of The Shirts), Ellen Foley (the famous female voice on Meatloaf's "Paradise By The Dashboard Light" song) and Cleavant Derricks (the sci-fi series Sliders). I, on the other hand had no agent like they did and became a struggling actor after the show closed auditioning for various new musicals in NYC. I auditioned and was cast in only one film, "Night Of The Zombies" which is now a cult classic and starred a famous male porn star.

In 1979 I redirected my life back to music and songwriting and formed a rock band originally called The 80's. Our first performance was at the Fast Lane in Asbury Park, NJ. The live peformance of that show was recorded and will be available on CD in the future. We then decided to change our name to The Elektrics and within a year we were signed to Capitol Records. Our first single "Some Lovin' Tonight" was released in 1980. As lead vocalist and songwriter of the group I used my theatrical skills and put on a real, high energy show with masks and various props. The only film footage of some of our live performances can be seen on this website which includes The Elektrics performing our second single "Boardwalk Beauty". We recorded 2 albums, "Current Events" in 1980 and "State of Shock" in 1981. Both were critically well recieved in many of the music publications. Rolling Stone magazine gave our second album 3 and a half stars. Unfortunately, MTV just started airing but Capitol Records didnt have the foresight to see the potential of producing music video's for the The Elektrics so we never shot a music video. We opened for some very famous and popular musical performers including The Motels, The Psychedelic Furs, Annie Golden and The Shirts, Iggy Pop and Alice Cooper. We also did an east coast tour with Robert Palmer. Although we never went gold or platinum as far as record sales, Capitol Records was very happy with us and was interested in a third record from us but we disbanded due to artistic differences.

In 1991 I reunited with Elektrics guitarist and songwriter Marco Delmar and we both produced an album entitled "Walking On The Palm..." which has never been released but will be available for purchase in the near future. Marco is now an award winning producer at Recording Arts Productions based in Fairfax, VA. The website to his recording studio can be viewed on the Links page. My new compilation CD "Wornerworks Various '75 to'95" will be available for purchase and contains songs of various styles and moods spanning a 20 year period. Go to my Carl's Cd's page for more info. I am currently recording a new CD with producer Gary Georgett entitled "No Justice". My radio plays which I produced with The Insomniac Players in the early 90's will be available for purchase as a boxed set. Several of my plays featured on the CD's were broadcast on National Public Radio's NPR Playhouse series. As far as Future performances...well you'll have to go to that page to find out.