Hamsters for Jesus

Oh please....

Alvin and the Chipmunks (or Pinky and Perky if you prefer) have got a lot to answer for. Charlie the Hamster along with his cousins Stanley and Huey, made a series of God bothering albums along with their human handler Floyd Robinson in the late 60s-early 70s before Ross Bagdasarian Jr - the son of Alvin's creator David Seville - sued Robinson in 1977 for plagiarism and copyright infringement. Robinson and his record companies quickly agreed to cease immediate production, distribution and sale of all of Robinson’s Charlie the Hamster records. Clearly 'thou shalt not steal' was one of the 10 commandments Charlie and Floyd decided could safely be ignored, as the pair produced some 14 albums of inane Christian caterwauling. Only Little Marcy the singing evangelistic dolly 'recorded' more christian crap than these critters.

It's an unpleasant blemish on an otherwise reasonably distinguished career. Born in Nashville in 1938, Floyd Robinson was barely in his teens when he formed his first band, had regular shows on Nashville's WLAC and WSM radio stations whilst still in High School and toured with George Jones, Jim Reeves and others. In 1958 he wrote the novelty song The Little Space Girl for his cousin Jesse Lee Turner, who scored a top 20 hit with the song in 1959, the same year as Floyd scored his own top 20 debut with Makin' Love. Active throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s as a session musician, producer and engineer, more recently he has published two books, the instruction manual Guitar Playing Made Easy and the novel The Guitar. Nowadays Floyd has all but turned his back on music: he owns a used car dealership.

So here are a couple of Charlie the Hamster tracks for you to enjoy, both taken from 'his' Teaches Bible Stories album: It's Fun to Live for Jesus and The B-I-B-L-E