John's Children were a 1960s rock band from Leatherhead, England that briefly featured future T. Rex frontman Marc Bolan.

In 1965 in Great Bookham, near Leatherhead, England, drummer Chris Townson and singer Andy Ellison formed a band called the Clockwork Onions, which later became the Few, and then the Silence.

[5] He changed their name to John's Children, dressed them up in white stage outfits and encouraged them to be outrageous to attract the attention of the press.

"[5] To Napier-Bell's surprise "Smashed Blocked/Strange Affair" broke into the bottom of the US Billboard Hot 100 and reached local top ten charts in Florida and California.

In early 1967 they released their second single, "Just What You Want – Just What You'll Get/But You're Mine", which also featured session musicians, plus a guitar solo from the Yardbirds's Jeff Beck on the B-side.

[5][7] Bolan composed and sang on the band's next single, "Desdemona",[11] which was banned by the BBC because of the controversial lyric, "Lift up your skirt and fly.

In April 1967 Napier-Bell arranged for John's Children to tour Germany with one of Britain's premier rock groups, the Who, as the latter's supporting act.

"[3] But the Who got their revenge on Townson for John's Children's "reckless behaviour" on the German tour: at the end of his last gig with them, they "blew [him] off the stage" with flash powder.

John's Children re-formed in the mid-1990s with Boz Boorer on guitar and former Sparks and Radio Stars member Martin Gordon on bass, performing gigs for the New Untouchables[citation needed] in the UK, Italy, Spain and the US.

In 1999, Ellison, Townson and Gordon were joined by guitarists Trevor White (another former member of Sparks) and Ian Macleod (another member of Radio Stars) to perform a selection of John's Children, Jet and Radio Stars repertoire, released as Music for the Herd of Herring and recorded in the UK, the Netherlands and Germany.

[8] Ellison, Hewlett and Townson plus guitarist Trevor White officially re-formed John's Children in June 2006 and performed and recorded occasionally until 2013.

"[5] In a Chris Townson obituary published in The Independent in February 2008, Pierre Perrone wrote that John's Children's live performances had "raw energy and power chords worthy of the Who.

"[7] He said that they came from an era that is "for the most part misunderstood, either cloyingly romanticised or short-sightedly vilified", and today the story of John's Children is "relegated to a condescending historical footnote.

[8] In his history of glam rock, Simon Reynolds commented on John's Children's distinctive sound, writing that on songs such as "Jagged Time Lapse", "Remember Thomas à Beckett" and "Midsummer Night's Scenes", "there's barely anything you could call a proper chord, let alone a riff; just spasms of distortion, staccato jolts, drum-roll gear shifts, swathes of sustained feedback that appear and disappear without good reason, blissed-out moans and gasps.

"[15] Reviewing the compilation Nuggets II (2001) for Uncut, he wrote that the band's lack of success remains a mystery, describing "Desdemona" and "A Midnight Summer's Scenes" as "astoundingly deranged, the monstrously engorged fuzzbass like staring into a furnace, the drums flailing and scything like Keith Moon at his most smashed-blocked."