Nat Kendrick and the Swans

Nat Kendrick and the Swans wasn’t really a band at all — it was a contractual smokescreen for James Brown and his touring group, the future JBs. In late 1959, King Records boss Syd Nathan refused to let Brown record instrumental material with his own band, so Miami producer Henry Stone cut the session anyway on his independent Dade label and credited it to the group’s drummer, Nat Kendrick, with the rest of the band relabelled “the Swans.”

Brown played piano on the sessions himself, and his own vocal ad-libs were overdubbed by Miami radio DJ Carlton “King” Coleman to help disguise his voice from King Records. The disguise worked commercially: “(Do the) Mashed Potatoes” hit #8 on the R&B chart and dented the pop Hot 100 in 1960, sparking a short-lived wave of “Mashed Potato” dance records across the industry.

The small run of singles that followed — including “Dish Rag” and “Wobble Wobble” — is now recognised by soul historians as an early sighting of the rhythmic, groove-forward sound Brown would fully develop into funk later in the decade, which makes these records a genuine missing-link item for funk collectors rather than a mere novelty or curiosity.