Vegas Concert Goers Duped by Fak

Vegas Concert Goers Duped by Fake Band Members

Chip Yost
KTLA-News

May 22, 2008, 9:25 AM PDT

When you drive into Las Vegas, it's hard to miss the billboard for the big show at the Sahara Hotel. Advertised as a chance to "experience rock and roll history," the show features the Platters, the Marvelettes and Cornell Gunter's Coasters. The hits put out by the groups on the bill include "Please Mr. Postman" and "The Great Pretender."

Now, critics say the show itself is a pretender – putting out people who had nothing to do with the original acts and passing them off as the real thing. When KTLA called the ticket office to inquire about the show, we were twice told that each group on the ticket included at least one original member of the group.

In person, a lady at the ticket office told us that all of the Marvelettes were originals and that one of the Platters had been with the group for 38 years. That claim was repeated on stage later that evening at the show.

Last week, we took Sonny Turner and Charlie Duncan to the show with us to find out if any of those claims were true. From 1959 to 1970, Sonny Turner was the lead singer on a number of the Platters hits. For more than a quarter of a century, Charlie Duncan performed with Cornell Gunter in Cornell Gunter's Coasters – a spin-off of the original Coasters. Charlie and Sonny recognized nobody on stage as having anything to do with their groups. As for the Marvelettes, none of that group's singers even looked old enough to be alive when "Please Mr. Postman" topped the charts in 1961.

When Sonny confronted the "38 year" Platter after the show, story-line changed. In Sonny's presence, the performer 'he' had never claimed to be a member of the Platters, but instead claimed he had only worked for a former member of the group.

The day after the show, we stopped by the Sahara to try to get an explanation. When Andrea Sun, a hotel spokesperson, came down to talk to us, she repeated the claim that each group contained at least one original member and said the hotel was unaware of any dispute over that statement.

However, she later said she couldn't make any more comments after learning that the hotel was facing litigation over a previous act that was once part of the same show. The hotel referred us to the show's promoter, National Artists, Inc. for further comment. Sun said National Concerts, Inc. is responsible for booking the acts in the show.

National Artists' Bill Caron admitted to us that none of the performers we saw on stage were part of the original recording groups. Caron said that nobody should have ever made claims otherwise, but he defended the authenticity of the show by claiming that the promoters of the show owned the trademarks to the groups' names, and therefore had the right to put up any group of people it wanted to on stage.

People connected to the original groups challenge the trademark claims made by the promoter. Such claims have been part of a lot of much litigation, and more is likely in the near future. There's also been requests made that the Nevada Attorney General step in and apply a recently passed "Truth in Music" law, that some feel gives the state the authority to step in and try to have the show shut down.