Five years before The Wailers put reggae on the map, another band called The Wailers made their mark 3,300 miles away in America.

Back in 1958 a group of schoolboys aged 16, 17 and 18 formed a band on America’s Pacific North West coast. They called themselves The Nitecaps but quickly found a better name – The Wailers.

At the time Bob Marley was 13, and five years away from forming a group of the same name with a couple of pals in Jamaica. But no one seems to remember the original Wailers, who can claim to be the first garage rock band.

The original lineup of five high school friends – Kent Morrill (vocals, keyboards), Rich Dangel (lead guitar), John Greek (rhythm guitar, trumpet), Mark Marush (tenor sax) and Mike Burk (drums) – struck lucky with the very first song they recorded.

A lively piano and sax-led instrumental called Tall Cool One made the Top 40 on the Billboard chart in 1959, and earned the teenagers a cross-country trip to New York to make an album that they called The Fabulous Wailers.

Unlike their Jamaican namesakes, they proved to be one hit wonders. Subsequent singles, Mau Mau and Wailin’, failed to match their early success and, dropped by their label, they returned to the North West.

In a bid to revive their career they abandoned their instrumental style and teamed up with the singer of a rival Tacoma band, The Bluenotes, who went by the stage name of Rockin’ Robin Roberts, and occasionally appeared with them between studies for his masters in biochemistry at the local university.

In 1961 they went into the studio together to record an obscure RnB song by Richard Berry called Louie Louie. It wasn’t a national hit but proved popular in the Seattle area and soon reached the ears of another band in nearby Portland, Oregon, called The Kingsmen, who recorded what would come to be regarded as the definitive version of the song.

During the Labor Day weekend in September 1962 The (Fabulous) Wailers made news headlines when thousands of unruly teenagers roamed the streets in the resort town of Seaside, Oregon, after the band’s scheduled show at a roller rink was cancelled.

The Seaside Riots, as they came to be called, continued into the next day so, in an attempt to divert the attention of the throngs of teens, the authorities allowed The Wailers to play on the roof of a building. This is the tune they performed: a song that they had yet to title, so it became known simply as Doin’ The Seaside.

After that The (Fabulous) Wailers continued to play gigs locally, where their fans included a young man learning the guitar called Jimi Hendrix, who much admired the fiery style of Rich Dangel, and sometimes performed with a teenage singer called Gail Harris.

In all they recorded and released four albums and a succession of singles between 1962 and 1966 on their own Etiquette label, and also signed The Sonics, who took their signature sound even further on two albums for the label.

In 1965 they switched styles again and began using the Orbison-like vocals of Ron Davies, who wrote and sang the emotional ballad It’s You Alone, which became their second-best-selling single (after Tall Long One), before splitting up four years later – by which time Kent Morrill was the last remaining original member.