The Guytones - Tell Me (How Was I To Know) 1958 UT

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The Guytones (Philadelphia, PA)

Personnel:
James Brown Robinson (Lead)
Stanley Evans (Lead)
Floyd Richards
Joe Tiggle
Arthur Hunter
Eddie Beasley

Biography:
In 1957, James Brown Robinson and a group of other young crooners got together in the Queen Village neighborhood and harmonized wherever they could get a location. They were heard by local DJs Cannonball and Irv Timbers, "who both loved the sonic beam of young ensemble's united voices". The DJs arranged an audition with Cincinnati's De Luxe Records. Along with co-lead singer Stanley Evans, Floyd Richards, Joe Tiggle, Arthur Hunter and Eddie Beasley, the Guytones went to New York City, where they recorded 12 sides for De Luxe.

The Guytones were greatly influenced by a popular R&B band, the 5 Royales, out of Winston-Salem, N.C. When the boys got to New York, they were given some songs to sing, besides those that they had brought with them. So, they repaired to a bathroom to rehearse. But out of the session with De Luxe came such doo-wop classics as "Ooh Bop Sha Boo," "Young Dreamer," "Hunky Dory," "She's Mine," "This Is Love," and others.

In one of those nasty twists of fate, the group got a contract from Decca Records, which was looking for a Guytones-type group in 1959. But the unsigned contract accidentally was put in a closet and not discovered by the boys until it was too late. Decca hired another group. Meanwhile, James went to work for the resistor company, then at Broad and Callowhill streets, in 1957 to support his wife and seven children.