The Coasters

The Coasters Artistfacts

  • 1955-
    Carl GardnerLead vocals1955–2005
    Billy GuyBaritone vocals1955-1973
    Bobby NunnBass vocals1955-1957
    Leon HughesTenor vocals1955-1957
    Adolph JacobsGuitar1956-1960
    Will "Dub" JonesBass vocals1958-1967
    Cornell GunterTenor vocals1958-1961
    Elbert McKinley "Sonny" ForriestGuitar1959-1961
    Earl "Speedo" CarrollTenor vocals1961-1979
  • The Coasters trace their roots to the Robins, a Los Angeles vocal group formed in 1949 that recorded some of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller's earliest hits, including "Riot In Cell Block #9" and "Smokey Joe's Cafe."
  • In 1955, the Robins fractured over a business dispute: whether to stay independent on the West Coast or sign with Atlantic Records and relocate east. Leiber and Stoller took Bobby Nunn and Carl Gardner from the Robins, added new singers Leon Hughes and Billy Guy, and formed the Coasters.
  • The Coasters' name was a nod to the group's Californian roots and their coast-to-coast relocation from Los Angeles to New York.
  • The rebranded Coasters kept working almost exclusively with Leiber and Stoller, who wrote, produced, and arranged practically every one of their singles between 1956 and 1961.
  • Leiber and Stoller's insistence on treating every song as a mini comic drama meant Coasters sessions often required far more takes than a typical 1950s pop recording, since the pair were chasing precise comic timing, not just a clean vocal performance.
  • The group's classic lineup didn't solidify until 1957, when tenor Cornell Gunter and bass Will "Dub" Jones replaced Leon Hughes and Bobby Nunn, rounding out the quartet most fans associate with the Coasters' biggest hits. Their breakthrough came that year with the double-sided single "Searchin'" and "Young Blood," which topped the R&B chart and cracked the pop Top 10 simultaneously.
  • The Coasters' run of hits through the late 1950s and into 1961, built on songs overflowing with teenage slang and wisecracking narrators, made them one of rock and roll's first acts to build an entire identity around comedy rather than romance or dance crazes.

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