Jewel Akens

The Four Dots (2) (Los Angeles)
aka The Composers

Personnel :

Jewel Akens (Lead)

Albert “Jerry” Stone (Lead)

Freddy Clark

Sam Dearden

Warn Crosby (Bass)

Discography :

Jerry Stone & The Four Dots (2)
1958 - My Baby (She Loves Me) / It's Heaven (Freedom 44002)

The Four Dots (2)
1959 - Don't Wake Up The Kids / Pleading For Your Love (Freedom 44005)

John Ashley bb The Four Dots (2)
1959 - I Want To Hear It From You / Seriously In Love (Silver 1002)

The Composers
1963 - I Had A Dream / You And Yours (Era 3118)

Biography :

The Houston-born singer spent his teenage years in Los Angeles; around 1958 he met Jerry Stone of doo wop group The Fascinators, whose "Shivers and Shakes" had been released that year on Walter "Dootsie" Williams' L.A.-based Dootone label. Jerry and Jewel formed The Four Dots with Warn Crosby, Freddy Clark and Sam Dearden (unwittingly taking the name of a Pittsburgh group that had recorded for Bullseye in 1956); entrepreneur Jerry Capehart, a songwriter and manager of Liberty Records rock and roller Eddie Cochran, took notice. "My Baby," a routine uptempo doo wop song credited to Jerry Stone and the Four Dots, appeared in the fall of '58 on a new Liberty subsidiary label, Freedom.

Cochran played guitar on the group's Freedom sides. "Don't Wake Up the Kids," a domestic novelty along the lines of The Coasters' chart topper "Yakety Yak," was promoted in trade magazines in January '59; Jewel composed the B side, "Pleading For Your Love," his name misspelled on the label as "Jewel Akins." Liberty had no further interest after these two singles, so Capehart started his own label, Silver, and had the group do backing vocals for actor John Ashley (star of late '50s guilty pleasures Dragstrip Girl, Motorcycle Gang and Hot Rod Gang) on his initial bid to be a singing idol; "Seriously in Love" was a good midtempo rhythm/teen track, but it failed to establish Ashley among the ranks of hitmaking actor-singers.  

  
                                                                                    John Ashley

In 1963, Jerry and Jewel formed the Composers. The Composers were an offshoot of the Four Dots. In 1963 they worked for Herb Newman at Era Records, demoing songs. They got their chance to record two Albert Stone songs for which Newman named the group the Composers. Though excellent sides, nothing happened with the release. Akens would come back to the label in 1964 when his other group the Turn-Arounds (formerly the Rainbows) cut ‘Ain't Nothin’ Shakin”, That same session had Jewel singing The Birds And The Bees’ as a solo because the group refused to sing the novelty song. Akens got sole billing and a new career when his record became a pop hit around the world.

https://www.waybackattack.com/akensjewel.html

Songs :

Jerry Stone & The Four Dots (2)

  
My Baby (She Loves Me)                           It's Heaven            

The Four Dots (2)

  
Don't Wake Up The Kids                   Pleading For Your Love

John Ashley bb The Four Dots (2)

  
I Want To Hear It From You                    Seriously In Love       


The Composers

  
I Had A Dream                                    You And Yours

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