Jesus Sound Explosion

by Mark Anderson

Mention the record album Jesus Sound Explosion to a typical child of the 1970s and that person is likely to picture one of those collections that used to be shown on TV (Call now! Not available in stores!). When Mark Curtis Anderson spied a copy in a junk store a few years ago, he knew just what he'd found, and the memories of growing up in a Baptist minister's family came flooding forth. The title of Anderson's memoir is a nod to the live concert album from Explo '72, a kind of evangelical Woodstock emceed by Billy Graham. Explo's crowds of 100,000-plus signaled that enterprising evangelicals were discovering how to use rock and roll in the marketplace of conversion. Anderson was eleven that year, too young to be at Explo but old enough to wish he was. Other preachers' kids may have gazed out at the wider world and craved its movies, clothes, or toys, but he wanted its music. And not just the Jesus-rocker fare of Explo's Armageddon Experience or Children of Truth, but the real stuff, too.

Jesus Sound Explosion recalls Anderson's quest for worldliness-through-rock as he came of age under the gaze, he often sensed, of his father's entire congregation. All of the backsliding and revival, idealism and disillusionment one would expect is here, told with delightfully understated humor and set against the sounds of The Guess Who, Yes, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Bruce Springsteen. Here is a knowing look back on a time when Jesus Christ Superstar climbed the pop charts, The Cross and the Switchblade hit the big screen, and anxious parents played their kids' records backwards in search of hidden messages from Satan.

Genres: Music

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Librarian Note: There are more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Casey Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best memoirs I've ever read! Good if you're really into music and how it affects our lives. Does a lot of questioning of the Christian faith and whether it's even possible to be a strong Christian growing up in American in the 60s/70s. Anderson does this respectfully, but brutally honestly - it will probably be easier for those with these same questions, like myself, to connect with him versus those who are steadfast in their convictions. I felt a kinship to Anderson that I haven't often felt reading other memoirs.

[Don Incognito · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had to read Jesus Sound Explosion in a creative writing course. This is a memoir by a guy who was raised Christian, being a pastor's son, but lost his faith. He loves rock music, and throughout his youth and young adulthood, rock competes with religion for his allegiance. Rock eventually wins out.
It may not be intentional, but the book gives the sense of a wasted life. He somehow never got it. My professor believed Anderson was, consciously or not, seeking salvation by works rather than by grace through faith. (I think she was right, because young Anderson keeps thinking about "rededicating himself to Christ," and at least one Christian pastor I know of has suggested that thinking of "rededication" indicates a salvation-by-works problem.
Anderson is nobody famous, but as of the publication date, teaches writing at a college somewhere--Minnesota, I believe the book said. The title of the book comes from the album collecting the music from "Explo '72"--a Woodstock of Christian rock bands.

[Walter · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the reviews on the back cover reads, "a heartfelt, funny, and offbeat memoir." Right on!