The Rise and Fall of the Penguins

After Shaboom, the crew-cuts had briefly tried to go back to barbershop harmony with a version of the Whiffenpuff song. But when that did nothing, in quick succession they knocked out hit, bland covers - first of Earth Angel and then of Kokomo. It shows how times were slowly changing that the penguins' version also made the top ten on the pop charts as Johnny Ace had before them. The practice of white artists covering black artists' songs would continue for a while, but within a couple of years it would have more or less disappeared,. only to come back in a new form in the 60s.