Properly speaking, Harlequin Productions' Sixties Kicks isn't musical theater, it's a concert. Five talented young people backed by a killer five-piece rock band sing 37 hits of the 1960s. I'm not a music critic, but I don't have to be Lester Bangs to give a thumbs-up to the source material.

In a conversation with Scot Whitney, director Linda Whitney's husband and partner, I learned that the vagaries of intellectual property law permit the compilation of such a concert, assuming proper ASCAP fees have been paid, but deny the addition of dialogue. No problem. All we need to know about the era was either flashed on a video screen or pre-inscribed in our collective historical memory.  Unlike the cast, I was born in the '60s, and I remember these tunes blasting from the AM radio in my parents' Malibu station wagon. Sixties Kicks is the soundtrack of my early childhood.

The cast and band are rock solid.  Brad Schrandt, for example, plays keyboards, flute and saxophone, all in the same act.  Alison Monda is fully committed as usual, roaring through "Magic Bus" and "House of the Rising Sun."  Monda's fiancé Matthew Posner works his Daltrey chops on "Won't Get Fooled Again" - and his Act II costume makes him look unnervingly like '70s icon Freddie Prinze.  (Note to Gen-Y readers:  I'm referring to Freddie Prinze Jr.'s father, a comedian who starred on a sitcom called Chico and the Man.)  Fellow Oklahoman Kate Dinsmore has a knack for hippie ballads.  (Note to Linda Whitney: Why in the Haight didn't you give Dinsmore a Nancy Sinatra number in Act I?)  But the emotional highlight of the show, for me and other Lennon-McCartney idolaters, is Antonia Darlene's gospel rendition of "Let It Be."  I wiped away tears.

Then there's Mike Lengel, with whom I had issues throughout Act I.  He's an odd physical match for the rest of the cast, he's a less-than-terrific dancer and his "Light My Fire" had all the uncaged hypersexuality of a 2008 Chevy Aveo. But he finally won me over with two reverential Dylan numbers and all was forgiven.  His clear high end and falsetto are well-suited to the Bard of Duluth. Lengel led the cast in a rousing "Revolution" to close the show, not the first time patrons danced in the aisles.  I wish the band were in '60s apparel, and I'm not sure each song was matched with the right singer, but Sixties Kicks is polished (with a shit-ton of solid choreography, courtesy of Nikki Womac), colorful, and happy-making. 

Let it be, indeed.

A protracted, woefully ill-advised war. Minorities striving for equal rights, including the right to marry for love. Economic uncertainty, coupled with rampant mistrust of government. Sound familiar?  When we think of the 1960s, we're mindful of social strife, absolutely, but inspired by a song list that colors all that discord with idealistic passion. So tell me, hipsters of 2010, where the hell are all your unforgettable protest songs?  Where's your musical outrage?  Are you too busy downloading "California Gurls" onto your iPod?  I tried like hell to list 37 songs from the last decade that would merit a compilation like Sixties Kicks; you should, too.  You might find the exercise both enlightening and discouraging.  If a Gulf-choking oil spill can't inspire a classic protest song, God help us all.

Sixties Kicks

Through July 31, 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday, $34-$37,
Harlequin Productions, 204 Fourth Ave. E., Olympia
360.786.0151, harlequinproductions.org