The Coasters

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The Coasters
The Coasters, 1957
The Coasters, 1957
General information
Genre (s) Rhythm & Blues , Rock 'n' Roll , Doo Wop
founding 1955
Website www.angelfire.com
Founding members
Carl Gardner (until 2005)
Tenor singing
 Leon Hughes (until 1958)
Billy Guy (until 1972)
Bobby Nunn (until 1958)
Adolph Jacobs (until 1958)
Current occupation
Tenor / baritone singing
 Carl "Mickey" Gardner jun. (1998–2001, since 2004)
Baritone singing
 Alvin "Al" Morse (since 1997)
Bass vocals
 Ronnie Bright (from 1968)
Tenor singing
 JW Lance (from 2001)
guitar
 Thomas "Curley" Palmer (from 1962)
former members
Tenor singing
 Cornell Gunter (1958–1961)
Bass vocals
 Will "Dub" Jones (1958-1967)
Tenor singing
 Obie Jessie (1957)
Baritone singing
 Jimmy Norman (1973-1997)
Tenor singing
 Earl Carroll (1961-1979)

The Coasters was an American R & B - vocal group of the 1950s.

history

The band was formed in October 1955 in Los Angeles . The origin was the group The Robins , founded in 1949 around their then lead singer Bobby Nunn. In early 1954 tenor Carl Gardner joined them.

In the spring of the same year, the famous producer team Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller , who had already written the song That's What the Good Book Says for The Robins in 1951 , took on the quintet and from then on produced its records on their newly founded Spark label. Some classics emerged, such as Riot in Cell Block No. 9 and Smokey Joe's Cafe , with the critical and humorous lyrics typical of the later Coasters hits, but absolutely unusual for the circumstances at the time.

Nesuhi Ertegün of Atlantic Records became aware of the single Smokey Joe's Cafe , released in August 1955 . When Leiber / Stoller signed a production contract with Atlantic Records in September, the single was released again on the ATCO subsidiary label, which brought the group The Robins to number 10 in the R&B charts and number 73 in the pop charts, their greatest success to date . Leiber and Stoller realized that this success would never have been possible with their small label, and so eventually all of Spark's material was sold to Atlantic.

This fact now raised the question of whether The Robins would also switch to Atlantic with the hit composers, whereupon the band finally broke up. So Bobby Nunn and Carl Gardner from the Robins went to Atlantic with Leiber and Stoller and founded the new formation "The Coasters" in October 1955 together with Leon Hughes, Billy Guy and Adolph Jacobs on guitar, which got their name based on their origin the band got from the American west coast. The rest of the Robins continued - without much success - with new band members until the early 1960s.

Leiber and Stoller have been their producers since the founding of the Coasters and also wrote almost all of the hits for the band; the coasters became the most important vehicle for the compositions of the team of authors. They recorded their first songs as early as January 1956, including their debut single Down in Mexico , which also made it into the top 10 of the R&B charts. From 1957 onwards, some successes followed that made the Costers famous, but not particularly big: they only got $ 5,000 a week. It was a time when black singers still had to be content with what they received. Young Blood and Searchin ' , both Leiber / Stoller songs, were the band's greatest hits of the year and their first top 10 positions in the US pop charts.

In 1958 Leiber and Stoller moved to New York . Guy and Gardner came with me while the others stayed in Los Angeles. Cornell Gunter and Will "Dub" Jones came as replacements. With Yakety Yak (March 1958) and Charlie Brown (December 1958), the Coasters' greatest successes appeared. King Curtis plays the saxophone on both recordings . The songs, both by Leiber and Stoller, are characterized by humorous and, for the time, rebellious lyrics. After Along Came Jones and Poison Ivy in 1959 and Little Egypt (Ying-Yang) in 1961, the great days of the Coasters were over.

In the 1960s, Gunter and Jones dropped out, replacing Earl “Speedo” Carroll (1961) and Ronnie Bright (1968). In 1971 the cover version of Love Potion No. 9 , a hit by The Clovers from 1959, was once again placed in the US pop charts. Shortly afterwards, Billy Guy also left the band, with whom he had only appeared sporadically since 1963 in addition to recordings, and was replaced by Jimmy Norman .

The band then toured the country as an oldie group. Since the 1970s and 1980s there were often several bands called Coasters, as Gunter and Guy had also named their new groups that way. In 1987 she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame . On this occasion, the original formation Gardner, Guy, Gunter and Jones came together for the last time.

Carl Gardner, together with Ronnie Bright, kept the Coasters together until the 2000s. On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the band in October 2005, Gardner, born in 1928, retired as lead singer, he died in June 2011 as the second-last member of the original line-up (only Leon Hughes, born in 1932, lives from the original line-up). As the new head of the Coasters, Carl Gardner Jr. followed in his father's footsteps.

Others

On April 21, 2016 version 16.10 of the Linux distribution Ubuntu was named after the Coasters title “Yakety Yak” in a slightly different spelling “Yakkety Yak” .

Discography

Singles with order numbers

Spark Records:

  • Riot in Cell Block # 9 / Wrap It Up (# 103), March 1954
  • Loop de Loop Mambo / Framed (# 107), August 1954
  • Whadaya Want / If Teardrops Were Kisses (# 110), September 28, 1954
  • One Kiss / I Love Paris (# 113), April 1955
  • The Hatchet Man / I Must Be Dreamin ' (# 116), June 1955
  • Smokey Joe's Cafe / Just Like a Fool (# 122 / Atco # 6059), July 7, 1955

Atco Records:

  • Turtle Dovin '/ Down in Mexico (# 6064), January 11, 1956
  • One Kiss Led to Another / Brazil (# 6073), January 11, 1956
  • Searchin '/ Young Blood (# 6087), February 15, 1957
  • Idol With The Golden Head / (When She Wants Good Lovin ') My Baby Comes to Me (# 6098), July 24, 1957
  • What is the Secret of Your Success? (July 24, 1957) / Sweet Georgia Brown (# 6104), February 15, 1957
  • Yakety Yak / Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart (# 6116), March 17, 1958
  • The Shadow Knows / Sorry but I'm Gonna Have to Pass (# 6126), August 8, 1958
  • Charlie Brown / Three Cool Cats (# 6132), December 11, 1958
  • Along Came Jones / That Is Rock & Roll (# 6141), March 26, 1959
  • Poison Ivy (July 16, 1959) / I'm a Hog for You (# 6146), July 17, 1959
  • Run Red Run (July 23, 1959) / What About Us (# 6153), July 16, 1959
  • Besame Mucho (Part I) (# 6163), February 26, 1960
  • Stewball (March 17, 1958) / Wake Me, Shake Me (# 6168), February 26, 1960
  • Shoppin 'for Clothes (# 6178), July 29, 1960
  • Thumbin 'a Ride (July 29, 1960) / Wait a Minute (# 6186), December 4, 1957
  • Little Egypt (Ying-Yang) / Keep On Rolling (# 6192), February 9, 1961
  • Girls Girls Girls (Part II) (# 6204), February 9, 1961
  • Bad Blood / (Ain't That) Just Like Me (# 6210), September 25, 1961
  • Teach Me How to Shimmy (# 6219), April 10, 1961
  • Bad Detective (# 6300), December 17, 1963
  • Hungry (# 6341) April 10, 1961

Date Records:

  • Down Home Girl / Soul Pad (# 1552), November 18, 1966
  • DW Washburn (October 31, 1967) / Everybody's Woman (# 1617), October 30, 1967

More publishments:

  • Act Right / The World Is Changing , 1969
  • Love Potion No. 9 / DW Washburn , November 1971
  • Cool Jerk / Talkin 'Bout A Woman , April 1972
  • Soul Pad / DW Washburn , 1973
  • Hush Don't Talk About It / The World Keeps On Turning (as Carl Gardner & the Coasters), 1976

literature

  • Jay Warner: The Billboard Book Of American Singing Groups. A History 1940-1990 . New York City: Billboard Books, 1992, pp. 124-126.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, The Coasters in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ( Memento from March 25, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ↑ BBC News : Coasters singer Carl Gardner dies aged 83 , June 14, 2011.
  3. ↑ http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/1496