The Coasters

The Coasters are an American rhythm and blues/rock and roll vocal group who had a string of hits in the late 1950s. With hits including "Searchin'", "Young Blood", "Charlie Brown", "Poison Ivy", and "Yakety Yak", 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. In 1987, they were the first vocal group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.The Coasters were formed on October 12, 1955, when Carl Gardner and Bobby Nunn left Los Angeles-based rhythm-and-blues group the Robins and signed to Atlantic Records. Dubbed the Coasters because they had moved from the West Coast to the East Coast, the original lineup comprised the vocal quartet of Gardner, Nunn, Billy Guy, and Leon Hughes (who was replaced by Young Jessie on a couple of their early Los Angeles recordings), plus guitarist Adolph Jacobs up until his departure in 1959.The songwriting team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller started Spark Records and in 1955 produced "Smokey Joe's Cafe" for the Robins (their sixth single with Leiber and Stoller). The record was popular enough for Atlantic Records to offer Leiber and Stoller an independent production contract to produce the Robins for Atlantic. 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, Carl Gardner and Billy Guy moved to New York with newcomers Cornell Gunter and Will "Dub" Jones to reform the Coasters. The new quartet was from then on stationed in New York, although all had Los Angeles roots.The Coasters' association with Leiber and Stoller was an immediate success. Together they created a string of "storytelling" hits 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.Their first single, "Down in Mexico", was an R&B hit in 1956. The following year, the Coasters crossed over to the pop chart in a big way with the double-sided "Young Blood"/"Searchin'". "Searchin'" was the group's first U.S. Top 10 hit, and topped the R&B chart for 13 weeks, becoming the biggest R&B single of 1957 (all were recorded in Los Angeles).

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.