I think it was recorded in the 50s, by a group called the "Crew Cuts." Does that ring a bell in anyone's memory?

I tried the ASCAP data base, with no results. Maybe it's BMI.

According to AMG:

Best of the Crew Cuts: The Mercury Years

Twenty-two tracks from their 1954-57 prime, with over a dozen hits, including "Sh-Boom," "Earth Angel," "Crazy 'Bout Ya Baby," and "Ko Ko Mo." Now that the original R&B/doo wop versions of most of the material is available for easy comparison, you'd have to be nuts to prefer these whitewashed covers, which sound incredibly quaint and lightweight. The Crew Cuts were never a bona fide rock & roll group, however. Judged solely within the context of other young White male harmony pop quartets of the time, such as the Four Freshmen </cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=SEARCH&sql=Bb9548qmtbtz4> and the Four Aces </cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=SEARCH&sql=Baz6ktr59kl7x>, they acquit themselves well with their accomplished vocal arrangements.

>>you'd have to be nuts to prefer these whitewashed covers<<

Yes indeed! The Chords original of Sh-Boom is GREAT doo-wop, and it's probably the 2nd real R&R record ever (after Gee by The Crows). The Crew Cuts did better than some, though -- compare The Flamingos soaring and soulful 'I'll be Home' to Pat Boone's insipid cover version to really get a sense of how bad it got!

I prefer "Martha My Dear".

Hi, and thanks for getting back to me. It occurred to me that if this is a "doo wop" group that maybe the song would not be considered to be in the jazz idiom. However, the song does swing, unlike the others on the album. If it's an English group, maybe that's why it was not in the ASCAP database.

I went ahead and ordered it anyway.

Bill S.

"Mostly Martha" was, I believe, recorded back in the 30's before the Crew-Cuts ever got around to it, possibly by one of the Boswell Sisters (Connie?). At least, this is what my Dad insisted: it was his favorite song at that point in time-he was then dating my mother (whose name was Martha).

The Crew Cuts version was a 'B' side to one of their singles ("Carmen's Boogie", based on the "Habenera" from "Carmen") which was NOT nearly as successful as "Sh-Boom" (I was in junior high school at the time, and owned the 45 single).

The song definitely predates the 'doo-wop' era.

BTW: the Crew Cuts were a Canadian group. And "Sh-Boom" was their 'whitebread' cover of the Chords hit record of 1954 for one of Atlantic Records subsidiaries ("Ko-Ko-Mo" was another cover they did of an R&B hit). Back in those days the only Black music acts that ever got mainstream radio airplay were Nat 'King' Cole, The Mills Brothers, Sammy Davis, Jr. et al. It was standard procedure in the record biz to get an R&B hit song and "take it pop" by covering it with a name White pop artist, since mainstream radio usually wouldn't play the Black originals. Perry Como (with "Ko-Ko-Mo"), Pat Boone (with "Ain't That A Shame?), Kay Starr ("Wheel Of Fortune") and Georgia Gibbs ("Tweedly-Dee") and others of that era got a lot of hits this way. It wasn't until 1955 or so that mainstream radio began changing its ways and playing the R&B originals; they started with Chuck Berry and Fats Domino.

Alan Freed in Cleveland was the most prominent of the white DJs to begin playing black music on his shows in 1955.


Other white covers of doo-wop from that era:

Sincerely by The Moonglows, covered by The McGuire Sisters
At My Front Door by The El Dorados, covered by Pat Boone
Little Darlin' by The Gladiolas, covered by The Diamonds
Hearts of Stone by The Jewels, covered by the Fontaine Sisters