What Would Jesus Play?

Hardcore Ark-passenger Christians are such a wacky lot.  There's a book out about What Would Jesus Eat?  I ready an article in my GQ the other month investigating this Ark mentality asking if Jesus worked out.  (For those of you who don't know, the 'Ark Mentality' is the mindless adherence to all things Christian...don't even talk about science or dinosaurs!)  Yesterday on the news I saw this new preacher who is starting a What Would Jesus Drive? movement.  That got me to wondering, what kind of guitar and gear would Jesus play? 

Just Imagine...

So there I was, backstage at the beautiful Alabama Theater in Birmingham to interview Jesus Christ on his first world tour in over 2000 years.  People said it would never happen, but after much soul-search and legal wrangling, the Savior has put together a top-notch outfit consisting of some of the greatest formerly dead musicians imaginable.  As a reporter for Alabama Guitar, my editor Craig Smoot had sent me down here to focus my interview with JC on the tech and equipment side of things, reasoning that all the socio-religious angles would be covered in mags like Time and Rolling Stone.  

It was the first time I had seen The Lord since I chanced upon him riding his Harley in the Hill Country just outside of Austin several years ago.  Granted, he was pretty dusty and gritty at that time, it being a murderously hot and windy summer day, but even so I thought he looked younger than the 32 years he had lived when his corporeal clock had stopped with that horrible crucifixion all those eons ago.  

He was wearing a blousy loose-fitting white peasant shirt made out of some fine gauze, light faded blue jean bell-bottoms just beginning to fray at the right knee, and some of the most killer hand-made cowboy boots I had ever seen.  His hair was long and and though fairly dark was lightly sun-streaked, his beard was short and well groomed.  His brown-green eyes sparkled and he wore a friendly and benign smile on his lips.  His coloring was a light olive, as you may expect from a Middle Easterner. He wore a very light load of jewelry: a small gold hoop in his left ear, a well-wrought but not gaudy serpentine gold chain around his neck, and a simple gold band on his left ring-finger. I had to query him on this.

"Yes, everybody wants to know if I'm married," he chuckled.  "To my true followers it should make no difference.  I always have time for everybody.  I have had an eternity to get to know many wonderful people very well.  It would not be as if I found a wife in some drinking establishment!"  His easy laugh said that he could see how ludicrous it would be for the Son of God to be out trolling in a pickup bar.

I asked him about the boots, saying that even since he decided to surface in the modern era, I had mostly seen him in sandals.  He smiled and sighed, then replied, "It is an image, something people expect.  I think walking about in robes, which were the blue jeans-and-t shirts of my first days, would be out of place now and look too much like costume.  I like to be comfortable like any mortal man.  I make the concessions to wear sandals in public, and flowing white shirts like this one which suggest that popular image of me.  For myself, I would be just as home in leather breeches, heavy boots, and a black Harley t-shirt.  That's what I was wearing when we last met."    I was flattered than he remembered me, but then again I suppose he remembers everything.

 He suggested that we go find a quiet place where we could talk, His dressing room.  The racket from the stage area as we began our conversation had intensified to the point that we were beginning to shout to be heard.  "It's just that Jimi loves to come down early to soundcheck and jam with whoever is available.  That sounds like Jaco plugging in now.  Maybe if we hurry with the interview, we can catch some fine space jazz from those two and whoever else shows up."

What a band!  Jesus and Jimi Hendrix on guitar, Jaco Pastorius on bass, Al Jackson switching off with John Bonham on drums, the double keyboard wizardry of Franz Liszt and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, topped with the divinely devilish electrified violin of Niccolo Paganini.  It has all the cliches of 'rock and roll heaven' and then some.

We found refuge in the Lord's dressing room, and were just about to close the door when in rushed a panting and sweating Arabic-looking man of about Jesus' age although a bit taller.  He had black curling hair stuffed up under a baseball cap with the logo "The Divine Tour 2003-2004" stenciled on it.  He whispered urgently in Jesus' ear. Jesus nodded, patted him on the arm and said, "Now, now Jude, don't make the same mistakes twice!  Use your head and you will see the line to take."  With that, the nervous man was gone.

Christ turned around and with a half-bemused, half-exasperated little sigh said, "You remember Jude from your Biblical history?"

"Judas Isacariot?  Man you do like to live dangerously."

"Everyone gets a second chance from me, you know that."

"In what capacity is he working?" I asked.

"He actually works for the record company.  Vice President."  I couldn't help it, and burst out laughing in spite of myself.  Jesus laughed along.  "I figure if old Jude can pay his penance and be an honest man within that group of demons he will deserve a place in heaven.  Of course it won't be easy, will it?"  I had to admit, the Lord has a twisted sense of humor.  I like it.

He gave me a quick tour of all his stuff, guitars, pedalboard, amps, the whole thing.  You would expect the Son o' God to have all the good shit, and he does, but what struck me was how simple it was.  We talked about the guitars first:

REPORTER:  I see you have five guitars there in all.  Two Strats, a flame-top Les Paul, a really beat-up ES335, and a Martin Dreadnought.  Tell me about the electrics first.

JESUS:  The Strats are my favorites, I use that old faded white one mostly. It's a '57 with a very worn maple neck.  Not much lacquer still left on the back, and very little on the fret board.  Plays like a dream.  The '63 with the rosewood board is my number two.  Not nearly as beat-up as Stevie Ray's old one, and all stock.  They both are.  The only things that have been healed are a couple of pots that gave up the ghost at different times.

REPORTER: Healed?

JESUS: Yes, its nice to be able to do that.  You don't even have to remove the screws to disturb the harmony the pickguard has created with the body over the years.

REPORTER: I notice what looks like a cigarette burn up on the headstock of the '63.  You don't smoke do you?

JESUS:  Heavens no!  Years before I decided to re-reveal myself to mankind, I was playing in this dive in Cleveland. One of Satan's demons was in the audience and wanted to test to see if I was who he thought I was.  He threw a lightning bolt across the club towards the stage and I intercepted it with the guitar's headstock.  The audience loved it and thought it was part of the show.  If I hadn't caught it, I'm afraid that the club would have burned down and many would have died.

REPORTER:  Man!  And I thought I got hecklers at the Jello Room... Let me ask you about your guitars, do you set them up yourself?

JESUS:  I putter about a little bit, but most of the maintenance is done by an Italian, Antonio Stradivari.  You're familiar with him, yes?

REPORTER:  Jeez!...uh sorry, but you really do have the best guys working for you.  

JESUS:  He just does it as a favor to me.  He always calls them my 'noise machines.'  I'm not so sure he's kidding! (laughs)  He really hates tremolos; he had to call DaVinci in the first couple of times he set them.  He's more at home working on Paganini's violins.

REPORTER:  How about strings?  Light or heavy gage? 

JESUS:  Fairly light, actually.  When Stevie first came over I went to see him and we swapped licks all night.  I tried to play his guitar, and let me tell you, changing water into wine was nothing compared with the effort you have to put out to bend THOSE strings!  (laughs)  I don't want anything that I would have to do anything supernatural to play.  While I am in human form I prefer to be as human as possible.

REPORTER:  Any special stuff on any of your guitars?  Pre-amps, locking nuts, Floyd Rose, etc?

JESUS:  No, everything is stock to the bone, just maintained and set up right.  And yes, I do go out of tune now and again just like everyone else.  But the trems on the Strats are set up so well you would be surprised at how close they hold their pitch.

REPORTER:  How about the Gibsons?

JESUS:  I bring out the Les Paul every night for a couple of tunes, Walls of Jericho especially.  Sometimes I go on a jag and play it for days on end, but I always return to the Strats.  There's just something about the pure tones they have that sounds angelic to me.  Of course, you can make it sound like a volcano if you want to.  The 335 is for when I'm in a 'BB' mood! (laughs)

REPORTER:  And the Martin?

JESUS:  That is probably my favorite guitar in the heavens.  I will play it on stage for an acoustic number, but I get the most pleasure out of just sitting back in a quiet corner or on a hillside and strumming so softly it makes what I call butterfly tones.  A very introspective instrument.

REPORTER:  Let's move on to your effects board.  I see you are pretty minimalist:  fuzz, overdrive, wah, and chorus.  All nice stuff, though.

JESUS: Yeah, I have an old Fuzz Face that Jimi gave me for my birthday last year.  It's great.  Likewise, my TS-9 Tube Screamer came from Stevie.  The wah is an old original Vox that has one of the best ranges I have ever heard.  The chorus is an old Boss CE-2 that I picked up in a pawn shop in Albuquerque.  Everything is run in line with some good cabling.

REPORTER:  Sounds like a pretty fool-proof system.  Now on to your amps.  What can you tell me about them?

JESUS: I try to keep it simple. I feel if you have a couple of good examples of the timeless amps, then you have the capacity to possess and create any tone you may need.  I have an old Plexi 50-watt Marshall with one old cabinet.  I actually picked that up in Bombay, amazingly enough!  I pair that with a 1964 blackface Super Reverb.  I sometimes use them separately and sometimes together.  I have a '66 twin with some Weber speakers that I set totally clean for when I require that sound.  They are all controlled by a three-way switch so I can have any or all on at once, but the Twin is never on when the others are.  It would be just too, excuse the expression Father, un-Godly loud!

REPORTER:  So you're not into the wall of 100-watt stacks, I take it?

JESUS:  Not at all.  With PA's being what they are these days, you simply don't need it.  What kind of Savior would I be if I tried to deafen my followers?  Even Jimi uses approximately the same amplification as I do.  And many of the bands that still have those gigantic stacks onstage are really only playing out of one head and one cabinet anyway.  I think that is ridiculous.  Kind of like having something stuffed down your pants to impress the ladies! (laughs)

REPORTER:  I guess that about wraps it up, thank you for taking time out of your hectic schedule to answer my questions.  One last one, though.  This is a beautiful theater, but you could be doing stadiums with your reputation.  Why stick with the smaller venues?

JESUS:  I think you already know the answer to that.  I am surrounded by such multitudes where ever I go, that I want to physically reach and touch every last person.  Smaller halls not only offer this opportunity, but the acoustics are much better than a football field or hockey rink.  I am not troubled by my critics who say that I am shutting out those who can't get into the smaller halls.  After all, anyone can reach me at any time.  And you don't even need a cell phone.

JimmyR  11/22/2002