The Coasters Down In Mexico

The Coasters Down In Mexico\r
The Coasters \r
[Singles As & Bs 1955-1959} CD Release 2012\r
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The Coasters are an American rhythm and blues/rock and roll vocal group that had a string of hits in the late 1950s. Beginning with Searchin and Young Blood, their most memorable songs were written by the songwriting and producing team of Leiber and Stoller. Although the Coasters originated outside of mainstream doo-wop, their records were so frequently imitated that they became an important part of the doo-wop legacy through the 1960s.\r
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History\r
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The Coasters were formed in October 1955 as a spin-off of the Robins, a Los Angeles-based rhythm and blues group that included Carl Gardner and Bobby Nunn. The original Coasters were Carl Gardner, Billy Guy, Bobby Nunn, Leon Hughes (who was replaced by Young Jessie on a couple of their early Los Angeles recordings), and guitarist Adolph Jacobs. Jacobs left the group in 1959.\r
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The songwriting team Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller had started Spark Records, and in 1955 produced Smokey Joes Cafe for the Robins (their 5th single with Leiber-Stoller). The record was popular enough for Atlantic Records to offer Leiber and Stoller an independent production contract to produce the Robins for the Atlantic label. Only two of the Robins—Gardner and Nunn—were willing to make the move to Atlantic, recording their first songs in the same studio as the Robins had done (Master Recorders). In late 1957, the group moved to New York and replaced Nunn and Hughes with Cornell Gunter and Will Dub Jones. The new quartet was from then on stationed in New York (although all had Los Angeles roots).\r
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The Coasters association with Leiber and Stoller was an immediate success. Together they created a string of good-humored storytelling hits that are some of the most entertaining from the original era of rock and roll. According to Leiber and Stoller, getting the humor to come through on the records often required more recording takes than for a typical musical number.\r
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Their first single, Down in Mexico, was an R&B hit in 1956 and appears (in a re-recording from 1970—still with Gardner singing the lead) on the soundtrack of Quentin Tarantinos Death Proof. The following year, the Coasters crossed over to the national charts in a big way with the double-sided Young Blood/Searchin. Searchin was the groups first U.S. Top 10 hit, and topped the R&B charts for 13 weeks, becoming the biggest R&B single of 1957 (all these were recorded in Los Angeles).\r
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Yakety Yak (recorded in New York), featuring King Curtis on tenor saxophone, included the famous lineup of Gardner, Guy, Jones, and Gunter, became the acts only national #1 single, and also topped the R&B chart. The next single, Charlie Brown, reached #2 on both charts. This was followed by Along Came Jones, Poison Ivy (#1 for a month on the R&B chart), and Little Egypt (Ying-Yang).\r
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Changing popular tastes and a couple of line-up changes contributed to a lack of hits in the 1960s. During this time, Billy Guy was also working on solo projects, so New York singer Vernon Harrell was brought in to replace him for stage performances. Later members included Earl Speedo Carroll (lead of the Cadillacs), Ronnie Bright (the bass voice on Johnny Cymbals Mr. Bass Man), Jimmy Norman, and guitarist Thomas Curly Palmer. The Coasters signed with Columbia Recordss Date label in 1966, reuniting with Leiber and Stoller (who had parted ways with Atlantic Records in 1963), but were never able to regain their former fame. In 1971, the Coasters had a minor chart entry with Love Potion No. 9 a song that Leiber and Stoller had written for the Coasters but instead gave to the Clovers in 1959. In Britain, a 1994 Volkswagen TV advertisement used the groups Sorry But Im Gonna Have To Pass track, which led to a minor chart placement in that country.\r
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In 1987, the Coasters became the first group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, crediting the members of the 1958-era configuration. The Coasters also joined the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 1999.