Los Angeles, CA (Top40 Charts / Beach Road Musi) Beach Road
Music LLC today announced acquisition of the historic Coed Records catalog - along with discovery in a dusty New York City apartment of a cache of classic recordings a half-century old.
It's been almost fifty years since many of these enduringly catchy songs of the 1950s and 1960s have been heard as originally produced.
Veteran music publisher George Paxton formed Coed in 1958, in New York's famed Brill Building. In keeping with the early east coast Doo-Wop style, Coed Records launched many noteworthy hits between 1958 and 1964 including the Billboard Top 10 teen standard, "16 Candles" by the Crests, and the smash-hit "You Belong To Me" performed by The Duprees. Other releases included hits by Trade Martin, The Rivieras, The Harptones and Adam Wade.
When Beach Road purchased the catalog, the company thought it was buying thirty master-tapes, including "16 Candles". Only when tape after tape was examined did technicians realize they were on to something bigger.
Almost as important as obtaining classic hits by Coed superstars such as the Crests and The Duprees was discovery of a virtual treasure-trove of unreleased Coed master tapes in the attic of a recording engineer's New York City apartment at the time of sale. It represents one of the great finds of early East Coast vocalists' work.
"Beach Road is truly excited about offering both consumers and collectors these heretofore unreleased masters," said Seth Berg, President of Beach Road, in announcing the discovery.
To complicate the release, many of the tapes were damaged and had to be re-wound in order to be digitized correctly. One of the tapes contains a rare recording of the Crests' lead singer, the late New Yorker Johnny Maestro, performing a song thought to be gone forever.
Mr. Maestro passed away in March. His song endures, and is currently being remixed and remastered at Capitol Studios in Hollywood, Calif.
LINK TO iTUNES:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/from-the-vault-the-coed-records/id417854310
