Jesús Bacalão’s Light Entertainment Programme is an all shellac/ 78 rpm mix series serving up an atomic cocktail, straight from the fridge. On tonight’s programme…

The Mighty Atom became a ubiquitous player in American Pop Culture during the 1950s; omnipresent in everything from  Atomic Fever induced media coverage to state funded films waxin' lyrical about the benefits of “the friendly atom”, as well as becoming the de facto plot device for a slew of pulp novels & sci-fi pictures. Ooh Wee- The atom had come to town. 

The Atomic Age sparked major social changes in the US, with Teenage/ youth culture becoming a distinct subculture for the first time. Unlike previous generations of Americans who came of age in times of war & depression, the prosperity & baby boom of the 1950s put significantly less responsibility on the shoulders of teens, which aided by the culture of consumerism, allowed them to wield economic power of their own. 

With the freedom & long greens to express their own fashion & interests, they caught the eyes of the film & music industries who recognised potential for a fresh market who wanted their ideals to be represented on records & the silver screen. This played a major role in shaping contemporary pop culture, with films like The Wild One & the meteoric rise of rock n roll embodying the youth rebellion. 

A sense of freedom permeated through the rest of society, which coupled with a strong sense of post war hedonism, also allowed a culture of sleaze to flourish, with pin up models becoming household names, the ever increasing popularity of underground burlesque & stag films and after 1957, the early exploitation films that developed into the grindhouse genre over the next decade. 

In no American city were these cultural changes more tangible than in Las Vegas. The Atomic Age saw ol’ Sin City shedding it’s 1940s reputation for Old West-esque ranches, replacing it with an exotic neon drenched ambience Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ated by the futuristic allure of boomerang modern design as well as the all hours entertainment. 1951 introduced two stars that would become staples in the city over the next decade, in the form of Frank Sinatra’s first performance at the Desert Inn & the first Atomic tests at the Nevada Test Site, the mushroom clouds of which were visible from Downtown. This set the Atomic Tourism boom in motion, transforming Las Vegas into Atomic City, USA. The aforementioned Desert Inn began advertising their prized North facing rooms offering unobstructed views of the Test Site whilst bars like Atomic Liqueurs concocted top secret atomic cocktails (The secret is— not to pour the vermouth, just to pretend you're pouring it). The city also decided to combine two of it's most popular attractions- nuclear bombs and showgirls- into an annual atomic themed beauty pageant, debuting with "Miss Atomic Blast" in 1952.

Additionally, The Age of the Atom saw the city catering to the raunchier appetites of it’s mid century clientele with an abundance of burlesque theatres and striptease clubs, whose salacious performances were accompanied by equally lewd exotic inflected rock n roll and steamy r&b grinds played by local bands. 

The rag tag assortment of tittilating tunes featured on tonight’s programme, a melange of rare cuts only available on shellac & major label hits, were recorded between 1949 and 1959 on the West Coast, Nevada and the bordertowns of the SW. They range from humid blues numbers- best served HOT round 4AM at your local juke joint or fallout shelter - to raucous tittyshakers featuring sax solos so obscene, so lurid that they were probably protested by religious groups. These platters not only capture the syrupy, refined sleaze of their time but much like a crystal ball made of pomade, they also predict the greasy future, laying a foundation for the garage rock, trash rock and surf mania bands of the 60s. Now, pour yourself a Nuclear Daquiri , kick back & of course, take it sleazy...

j.

Jesús Bacalão’s Light Entertainment Programme: Atomicana 1949-1959

Xianedelica 1966-1978: Xian Psych, Garage & Acid Folk from the Private Press

¡Extry Extry! JESÚS BACALÃO’S LIGHT ENTERTAINMENT PROGRAMME SPLITS FROM IT’S ALL-SHELLAC KICK ON A TRIP THRU THE REALMS OF XIAN PRIVATE PRESS VINYL

On Tonight’s Programme

Twas 66 & among the heads of the Haight, Spores of Disillusionment were germinating- inhaled twixt tokes of Acapulco G. Nam cocktailed with the Lysergic Prohibition were proving a potent downer

The bud of 66 bloomed a 67 & the Spores were palpable to a growing bouquet of Flower Chillen. The Dream was all but over when Time ran a story on hippies in Jan 67. No head had HEARD of a hippie & next thing ya know, they were coming to look at us like we was in a glass bowl, said Mickey Hart. Literally- 67 saw the maiden voyage of Gray Line's Hippie Tour, billed as A SAFARI THRU PSYCHEDELIA

Press drew youth like moth to flame. FORGET FLOWERS IN YA HAIR The Oracle headline read- pilgrims bring sleeping bags & scratch instead

Like THAT, Utopia became a cesspit of B&E; VD; bum trips on STP. The Spores’ prime symptom, spiritual void, was taking hold- exacerbated by culdesac forays into krishna, zen & the occult

& in this darkness... The Living Room

Est. by ex-beats who found salvation on LSD, TLR was a coffeehouse that offered beds for bible readings. 1000s of youth dropped by in 67, listening to the word of these counterculture evangelists. Their Jesus was presented as a revolutionary outlaw and their strain of worship stressed direct contact with Jesus via drug metaphors aplenty. This was a mainliner to the soul of the disenchanted doper- soon TLR was Saving over 20 a week- Jesus Freaks were here

coffeehousi/ street ministries swiftly dotted the Coast. TLR convert, Lonnie Frisbee, held services at SoCal's Calvary Chapel, now THE hippie church, it’s membership growin from 200 to 2000 in 3 months. Among the converts were musicians, many of which had played in bands in SF, who were now writing music for praise/worship, sonically rooted in the Frisco Sound. Performances by these freshly minted Christian Psych (dubbed Xian Psych by 90s collectors) bands were incorporated into services and went down a storm. Soon they were in the studio recording privately pressed LPs funded by the church/ by the bands themselves. In time, the lyrical subject matter had evolved, waxin not only on the XTC of Jesus, but also pre-conversion experiences with drugs/promiscuity & the alternative that was the Jesus Trip

As headlines blurred from RFK to MLK to Altamont, The Jesus People spread, with Calvary affiliates founding 20 communes across Cali before departing en masse, sending teams across the US & Canada. Other factions of Jesus People toured the US (& by the end of '70, Europe) too, sharing the gospel/ the farout sounds of Xian Psych. New communes were founded as were new bands who lay down their own private press LPs, flying the Frisco Sound’s freakflag

As Nam’s curtain closed, counterculture was absorbed by pop culture and so too, most of the Jesus Freaks folded into m'stream Christianity. The once radical music of the movement was dropped in favour of an MOR sound, later the lucrative Christian Contemporary Music industry. Though some bands from the salad days of xian music became stalwarts of that scene, most disappeared but some, like NYC based commune/collective, The Trees Community, spent the rest of the decade travelling the US, sharing their otherworldly sound in a converted school bus housing 
10 people
2 cats+dog
80 instruments. Now if THAT aint The Dream...

The cornucopia of Xianedelic delights on Tonight’s Programme were recorded largely by American Jesus Freaks, with a few sounds by their EU/CA counterparts. 92% of the records were privately pressed (with the remainder released by church funded indie labels), usually produced in numbers of 50-200, allowing the bands full creative freedom, which as you'll hear, was used to the fullest

Now, Praise The Lord, Take a Trip & Take it Sleazy

j.

Jesús Bacalão’s Light Entertainment Programme: Xianedelica 1966-1978

:::::::::::::::::Greetings Intrepid Traveller:::::::::::::::::
The Interzone Facility for Tourism & Synchronicity Affairs bids you, the reader, a bon voyage::::::::::::
               

For press enquiries, bookings, collaborations etchetera, etchetera transmit your verbal digits to sleazus.bacalao@gmail.com

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¡Extry! ¡Extry! Jesús Bacalão's Light Entertainment Programme: Xianedelica will be transmitted via the NTS 1 airwaves on June 29th (past tense)

¡Extry! ¡Extry! Jesús Bacalão's Light Entertainment Programme: Atomicana 1949-1959 Featured as MixXxtape of the week in Kaltblut Magazine:

http://www.kaltblut-magazine.com/exclusive-mixtape-jesus-bacalao/

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Jesús Bacalão

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