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Chicken Boy

by The Phobias

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about

From Richard's Route 66 trip.

Free download.

Excerpt from LA66: The End of the Mother Road and the story of Los Angeles by Richard Marris:

Chicken Boy is a 22-foot, late-60s International Fiberglass model; one of 400 made in Venice Beach by boat builder Steve Dashew. Artist Amy Inouye discovered him on top of a Chinese chicken joint on Broadway just three days after moving to LA. His avian ease in the middle of the downtown chaos convinced her she would be ok in this biggest of big cities. In 1984 she discovered the restaurant had been boarded up and hired a sign mover to pluck that Chicken off its lofty perch. He's now a celebrity on Figueroa St, Highland Park.

Corvette produced its first all-fiberglass automobile in 1953, sparking an interest in the lightweight, rust-proof material. Prewitt Fiberglass Animals didn’t do human figures until they were commissioned to build a giant Paul Bunyan for a client in Sacramento. When the client didn’t pay for the statue, owner Bob Prewitt loaded it onto a flatbed and took a road trip east on 66 until he found a buyer at the Lumberjack Café in Flagstaff, Arizona. A few years later Bob sold some molds, including the Bunyan, to plastic credit card inventor Stanley A. Dashew. He thought they would be a good side-line for his boat-building son Steve. When the giant men got some publicity in a trade magazine, International Fiberglass picked up business producing cowboys for Phillips 66 gas stations and Native Americans to promote Mohawk Oil’s outlets. For the next few years, the company churned out pirates, bikini-clad Jackie Kennedys, Uncle Sams and even Yogi bear-alikes.


Around 200 of them are still standing, looking down on the now-quiet side roads of America as the freeways roar past. Many of the businesses they promoted have long gone but the giants are playing the long game...

... If you're too hot wind your window down
We'll find something in the next town
Bleached out my memory, stuck to the seat
Blacktop melting sticky
Icy sugar sweet

Now there's nothing to sell
But they're not going to hide
There's still a story to tell
Out on the roadside....

... If Chicken Boy can make it here so can I
He's got a bucket of wings but he's not going to fly
A reassuring presence in the brutal blue sky
I know that he's with me but I don't know why

I don't know why
But I'm not going to fly

Welcome to a city full of lonely places
Dusty petrol highway between empty spaces
Looking for connection
Looking for traces
A glimpse of recognition is some stranger faces

I don't know why
But I'm not going to fly

Decades pile on decades and we're still here
Fighting the lonely beating the fear
Life and love such fragile things
Me and Chicken Boy, he's giving me wings

But I'm not going to fly
I don't know why...

... Main Street fading, like the ghosts on its wall
He's there in the shading, observing it all
As everything changes, cycles around
He's beyond rearranging
Looking down, holding ground

Photo (c) Los Angeles Times

credits

released January 21, 2019
Richard Marris: All lyrics and melodies. Vocals and guitars on part 1 and 3

Dick: vocals and arrangement on part 2

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The Phobias Brighton, UK

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