The Goldcoast Singers, "Here They Are" (WP-1806, 1962)

One of my favorite albums by Kingston Trio/Smothers Brothers style "folkies" of the early 1960s -- mostly because of the highly humorous treatment of serious issues of the day, like the Freedom Rides in "Peace Corps Rejects" or the Draft in "Please Mr. Kennedy", and what is probably the prototype of the perennial favorite "Plastic Jesus".

For sure, some of the humor is definitely "dated", but even almost 50 years later, this record makes me smile (and wish that the complete performance of that night had been preserved on tape to be released some day...).

From the original liner notes:

On a foggy Sunday afternoon in March of 1962, THE GOLDCOAST SINGERS clambered on stage at San Francisco State College before an unsuspecting audience of 1,000 or so. After they were introduced as the final performers at the San Francisco State Folk Festival, people in the audience mumbled, "Who?".  This query was followed by shouts of "More!". The reaction was, to say the least, wild. After five encores, breathless and perspiring like pigs, they came on for one last "song," entitled "Plastic Jesus." This ode flattened the audience. All through the performance people had been walking out of the auditorium grumbling, "Mis-guided youth" and "Whippersnappers," but the finale was too much for those whose soft spots had not yet been touched. A dozen (actually twelve) marched up the aisles in righteous indignation. The remaining nine hundred some odd rose in a tremendous ovation. Fortunately that concert was taped, and this record is the product.

COMPLETE LINER-NOTES (included as PDF)
 
ED RUSH on The Goldcoast Singers and the genesis of "Plastic Jesus"(scroll down to bottom of that page)

Excerpt:
"The song developed from listening to a radio station in Del Rio, Texas when I was about 12.
My best friend had a war surplus radio setup with a big antenna and on summer nights (TV had not yet arrived in Fresno, California) we spent a lot of time --trying to bring in radio stations from as far away as possible. Thats how we discovered XERB (I think those were the call letters) broadcasting from a very powerful transmitter across the border in Mexico. 

The station belonged to a Del Rio dentist and religious fanatic and they sold the most outrageous stuff imaginable, all with magical healing properties. One particularly egregious divine exhorted listeners to"LAY YORE HAND ON THE RAAD-EE-o IF YOU FEEL THE HEAT YOU'LL BE HEEEAALED!" 

This was followed by an appeal for contributions and a list of crypto-religious items for sale, including a glow-in-the-dark Jesus with a suction cup base to attach to your dashboard. This
item was guaranteed to protect the buyer from death on the highway. Another show included a hillbilly backup group that sang, among other ditties I've now mercifully forgotten, a song that included, "....something..something..something..leaning on the arms of Jesus, wrapped in the bosom of the Lord..." 

At the time it seemed so funny that we started changing it a bit and (with lots of gigglig) making up other words to the song, working in the suction-cup Jesus statue..and eventually ended up with a whole routine.

So that's the true story of Plastic Jesus. Irreverent teenagers with no respect laughing themselves silly in a dusty California town on hot summer nights in the middle 1950's.


Lyrics to "Plastic Jesus"
(The Goldcoast Singers)

MORE LINKS:

John R. Brinkley (pioneer of Mexican border radio stations)

NPR's "Honky Tonks, Hymns & The Blues":

"Border Radio & Country Music"

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TECHNICAL NOTES: 
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PART 1 (95 MB)
PART 2 (81 MB)