Robert "Bob" Kuban (born August 19, 1940) is an American musician and bandleader.

Career

Kuban was born in

St. Louis St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...

, United States, and was graduated from the St. Louis Institute of Music. In 1964, he formed the group Bob Kuban and The In-Men. Kuban was both its drummer and the bandleader. The group was an eight-piece band with horns, somewhat of a throwback for the time, considering that the

British Invasion The British Invasion was a cultural phenomenon of the mid-1960s, when rock and pop music acts from the United Kingdom and other aspects of British culture became popular in the United States and significant to the rising "counterculture" on b ...

, mounted primarily by guitar-based bands that had initially formed in the UK, was taking place during that period. Kuban was heavily influenced by

Ike & Tina Turner Ike & Tina Turner were an American musical duo consisting of husband and wife Ike Turner and Tina Turner. From 1960 to 1976, they performed live as the Ike & Tina Turner Revue, supported by Ike Turner's band the Kings of Rhythm and backing vocal ...

, whom he would watch perform at

Club Imperial The Club Imperial was a nightclub owned by George Edick (1928 – 2002), located at 6306-28 West Florissant Ave. in north St. Louis. During the club's heyday in the 1950s through the 1960s, acts such as Ike & Tina Turner, Chuck Berry, and Bob Kuban ...

in St. Louis before his band became regulars. He said, "I just loved the band so much... I mimicked a lot of the stuff that they did. We had the horn section in my band. When Ike and Tina Turner left, we were able to play there. We were there on Tuesday nights." He is best known for his 1966 No. 12 pop

hit Hit means to strike someone or something. Hit or HIT may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Fictional entities * Hit, a fictional character from '' Dragon Ball Super'' * Homicide International Trust, or HIT, a fictional organization ...

, " The Cheater". For this hit single Kuban is honored in the

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (RRHOF), sometimes simply referred to as the Rock Hall, is a museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and othe ...

's permanent exhibit on

one-hit wonder A one-hit wonder or viral hit is any entity that achieves mainstream popularity, often for only one piece of work, and becomes known among the general public solely for that momentary success. The term is most commonly used in regard to music p ...

s. After "The Cheater," Kuban never again scored high on the pop

charts A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabul ...

, although he did have two other top 100 hits: "The Teaser" peaked at No. 70; and a remake of the

Lennon–McCartney Lennon–McCartney was the songwriting partnership between English musicians John Lennon (1940–1980) and Paul McCartney (born 1942) of the Beatles. It is the best-known and most successful musical collaboration ever by records sold, with the ...

song " Drive My Car" went to No. 93. Kuban continues to be a fixture on the St. Louis music scene, and still tours and performs at private parties. Bob Kuban and The In-Men performed for the opening ceremonies of

Busch Memorial Stadium Busch Memorial Stadium, also known as Busch Stadium II, was a multi-purpose sports facility in St. Louis, Missouri, that operated for 40 years, from 1966 through 2005. The stadium served as the home of the St. Louis Cardinals National League b ...

in St. Louis on May 10, 1966; and The Bob Kuban Brass performed before the last regular-season

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

game there on October 2, 2005. In the 1960s, a spin-off of the group was a band called The Guise, led by In-Men organist and songwriter Greg Hoeltzel. The Guise performed in the 1969 St. Louis premiere of a composition by classical composer Arthur Custer and jazz composer

Julius Hemphill Julius Arthur Hemphill (January 24, 1938 – April 2, 1995) was a jazz composer and saxophone player. He performed mainly on alto saxophone, less often on soprano and tenor saxophones and flute. Biography Hemphill was born in Fort Worth, Texas, ...

titled "Songs of Freedom, Love, and War."

Death of Walter Scott

In a tragic coincidence,

Walter Scott Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'', ''Rob Roy (n ...

, who was the front man for The In-Men and the lead singer of "The Cheater", a song whose

lyrics Lyrics are words that make up a song, usually consisting of verses and choruses. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist. The words to an extended musical composition such as an opera are, however, usually known as a "libretto" and their writer, a ...

speak of infidelity, was murdered in 1983 by his wife's lover in a case that did not come to light until 1987. Scott's wife eventually admitted to helping conceal Scott's death.

Charted singles

* " The Cheater" - 1965 ( US #12) * "The Teaser" - 1966 ( US #70) * "Drive My Car" - 1966 ( US #93)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kuban, Bob Living people American drummers American bandleaders Music of St. Louis Musicians from St. Louis 1940 births