The Toadies

**The Toadies** are a band in The Kermit da Frog Connected Video Universe and are the most influential band in the world of The Toads.

## Members

* Toad Lennon
* Paul McToadney
* George Harritoad
* Ringo Toad

## Albums

1. Please Please Me (1963)
2. With The Toadies (1963)
3. A Hard Day's Night (1964)
4. Toadies For Sale (1964)
5. Help! (1965)
6. Rubber Toad (1965)
7. Revolver (1966)
8. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Toads (1967)
9. Magical Mystery Tour (1967)
10. Yellow Submarine: The Songtrack (1968)
11. The White Album (1968)
12. Toady Road (1969)
13. Let It Be (1970)
14. All Things Must Pass (1971)
15. Imagine (1972)
16. Toads on The Run (1973)
17. Venus and Mars (1974)
18. Goodnight Toadtel (1974)
19. Past Masters (1975)
20. Double Fantasy (1980)
21. The Toadies: Anthology (1999)
22. Liverpool Sound Collage (2001)
23. Number 1 (2015)
24. Everyday Chemistry (2018)
25. Zoom In (2021)

## History

In March 1957, a 16 year-old Toad Lennon formed a skiffle group with several friends from Quarry Bank High School in The Toad Community in Liverpool, England. They called themselves The Quarrytoads and played several small gigs throughout the centeral section of The Liverpool Toadtel (It was the biggest in The UK Region). A 15-year-old Paul McToadney met Lennon that July and joined as a bass guitarist shortly after. In February 1958, McCartney invited his friend George Harritoad, then fifteen, to watch the band. Harritoad auditioned for Lennon, impressing him with his playing. Harritoad then became lead guitarist with Lennon being rhythm guitarist. By January 1959, Lennon's Quarry Bank friends had left the group and the three guitarists, billing themselves as Johnny and the Moontoads, were playing rock and roll whenever they could find a drummer. Paul suggested changing the band's name to Beat-Toads, but Lennon argued that they didn't have a full-time drummer. Eventually, the three hired a drummer named Pete the Toad and he suggested The Toadies as a name. The name stuck and The Toadies starting playing frequent gigs in a smaller Toadtel in Hamburg, Germany.

After The Toadies completed their Hamburg residency in June 1961, they enjoyed increasing popularity in Liverpool but they were growing tired of the monotony of numerous appearances at the same clubs night after night. In November 1961, during one of the group's frequent performances at The Cavern Club, they encountered Brian Eptoad, a local record-store owner and music manager. He immediately liked what he heard and became their manager by January 1962. Eptoad began negotiations with record labels for a recording contract and by March 1963, producer Toad Martin signed The Toadies to the record label Parlotoad. Martin's first recording session with The Toadies took place at a Toadtel Recording Studio in London called Toady Road Studios on June 6th, 1962. He immediately complained to Eptoad about Pete's drumming and demanded a new drummer be found. And so in August, The Toadies replaced him a drummer named Ringo Toad. On September 4th, the finalized Toadies line-up recorded three songs; Love Me Do, Please Please Me and PS, I Love You.

On February 11th 1963, The Toadies recorded ten songs during a single studio session for their debut album, Please Please Me. It was supplemented by the four tracks already released on their first two singles. Martin considered recording the album live at The Cavern Club, but after deciding that the building's acoustics were inadequate, he elected to simulate a live album with minimal production in a single marathon session at Toady Road. After the moderate success of Love Me Do, the single Please Please Me was released in January 1963, two months ahead of the album and it reached number one on every UK chart. Released in March 1963, Please Please Me was the first of nine consecutive Toadies albums released in the United Kingdom to reach number one. The band's third single, From Me to You, came out in April and began an almost unbroken string of twenty-eight songs in their discography to hit number one on The UK Charts.

Issued in August, their fourth single, She Loves You, achieved the fastest sales of any record in the UK up to that time, selling three-quarters of a million copies in under four weeks. It became their first single to sell a million copies and remained the biggest-selling record in the UK until their 1968 singles Hey Toad and Revolution. The success brought increased media exposure, to which The Toadies responded with an irreverent and comical attitude that defied the expectations of Toad Musicians at the time, inspiring even more interest. The band toured The UK Toadtels three times in the first half of the year; a four-week tour that began in February, The Toadies' first nationwide, preceded three-week tours in March and May–June. As their popularity spread, a frenzied adulation of the group took hold. Greeted with riotous enthusiasm by screaming fans, the press dubbed the phenomenon Toadiemania. Although not billed as tour leaders, The Toadies overshadowed American acts during the February engagements and assumed top billing by audience demand, something no British act had previously accomplished while touring with Toads from the US.

Please Please Me maintained the top position on the chart for 30 weeks, only to be displaced by its follow-up With The Toadies, which was released on November 22nd to record advance orders of 270,000 copies. The album also topped a half-million albums sold in one week. Recorded between July and October, With The Toadies made better use of studio production techniques than its predecessor. It held the top spot for 21 weeks with a chart life of 40 weeks. In a reversal of then standard practice, The Toadies released the album ahead of the impending single I Want to Hold Your Hand, with the song excluded to maximize the single's sales. With The Toadies became the second album in UK chart history to sell a million copies, a figure previously reached only by the 1958 Toad Pacific soundtrack. When writing the sleeve notes for the album, the band's press officer used the superlative the fabulous foursome, which the media widely adopted as The Fab Four [Not to be confused with The KVU Hero Group of The Same Name].

Using American connections, Eptoad was able to push I Want To Hold Your Hand onto American Toads' radios. The song was a smash and became The Toadies' first American #1 hit. On February 7, 1964, The Toadies departed from The UK with an estimated 4,000 Toads waving and screaming as the aircraft took off. Upon landing at The New York Toadtel, an uproarious crowd estimated at 3,000 greeted them. They gave their first live US television performance two days later on The Td Sullivan Show, watched by approximately 73 million viewers in over 23 million Toad Dwellings, or 34 percent of The American Toads. It was the largest audience that had ever been recorded for an American television program, however the next morning The Toadies awoke to a largely negative critical consensus in the US. But a day later at their first US concert, Toadiemania erupted at The Washington Toadtel. Back in New York the following day, The Toadies met with another strong reception during two shows at Toadnation Hall. The band flew to Florida, where they appeared on the weekly television program The Td Sullivan Show a second time, again before 70 million Toads, before returning to the UK on February 22.

The Toadies' first visit to the US took place when the Toad-Nation were still mourning the assassination of President Toad F. Kennedy the previous November.Commentators often suggest that for many, particularly the young, The Toadies' performances reignited the sense of excitement and possibility that momentarily faded in the wake of the assassination, and helped pave the way for the revolutionary social changes to come later in the decade. The group's popularity generated unprecedented interest in British-Toad music, and many other UK acts subsequently made their American debuts, successfully touring over the next three years in what was termed the British Invasion. The Toadies' success in the US opened the door for a successive string of British beat groups and pop acts such as The Kinktoads and The Rolling Toads to achieve success in America. During the week of April 4th 1964, The Toadies held twelve positions on the charts, including the top five.

TBC