“Jesus Was Way Cool” by King Missile

For the 2010 Christmas Mix, I’ve decided to dip into my late middle school/early high school past and picked out 44 songs that I remember from before I could drive. All of the songs featured on the mix have been recorded from vinyl records in my own personal collection. I’ve had many of these records since the late 80s, early 90s. Over the advent season, I’ll be featuring one per day, counting down to Christmas party timewhen the mix itself will be released.

I was really into King Missile for awhile, but haven’t really listened to them since then. A friend of mine from high school loaned me a tape that had a bunch of their stuff on it. The spoken word stuff was always my favorite, though I can’t remember much anymore.

The tape had songs from the album “Jesus” was on (Mystical Shit) and the one after it (The Way to Salvation). Stuff like “The Boy Who Ate Lasagna and Could Jump over a Church,” “To Walk Among the Pigs,” “Cheesecake Truck,” “Take Stuff from Work,” and, obviously, “Jesus Was Way Cool.”

Being raised in a Christian home, I had been weary of things that spoke of Jesus in a less than favorable light. But this song, while possibly not the most serious thing in the world, put Jesus in pretty good standing:

If you were blind or lame
You just went to Jesus
And he would put his hands on you
And you would be healed
That’s so cool

Very true. Jesus did a bunch of cool things. And if he wanted to, he could have done a bunch more cool things:

He could’ve played guitar better than Hendrix
He could’ve told the future
He could’ve baked the most delicious cake in the world
He could’ve scored more goals than Wayne Gretzky
He could’ve danced better than Barishnikov
Jesus could have been funnier than any comedian you can think of
Jesus was way cool

Of course, it wasn’t all great times for Jesus. Mostly because he was so cool.

But then some people got jealous of how cool he was
So they killed him

That’s sad, but if you remember, it does have a pretty happy (and way cool) ending!

But then he rose from the dead
He rose from the dead, danced around
Then went up to heaven
I mean, that’s so cool
Jesus was way cool

No wonder there are so many Christians

That’s right. So how about you take a listen:

[audio:x23.mp3]