The Coasters

• Genre: Doo-Wop
• Hometown: Los Angeles
• The Coasters Website

About

The Coasters were one of the greatest vocal acts of the 1950s, and their songs remain among the most entertaining in pop history. They had numerous hits (almost all penned and produced by the legendary Leiber & Stoller), but the two tracks that still play heavily today are "Yakety Yak" and "Charlie Brown." However, as perfect as these two songs are, the rest of the Coasters' catalog offers plenty of humor, irony and sly social observations. Many of Lieber & Stoller's finest numbers, from "Three Cool Cats" to "Smokey Joe's Café" to "Riot in Cell Block #9," were vehicles for the Coasters and deserve to be heard as often as "Yakety Yak."

- Nick Dedina