Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Progressive Christian
Lying for Jesus

Lying for Jesus

Last updated on: May 18, 2007 at 6:00 am by John Shore

Lying for Jesus 2007-05-18T06:00:09-08:00 John Shore

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

About three weeks after my sudden conversion to Christianity (for the core gist of that story, see The Happiest Ending EVER), I got a job offer to be the editor of a much loved music magazine/tabloid here in San Diego. At that point SLAMM (“San Diego Lifestyle and Music Magazine”) had been in business for five years. They did 40,000 copies every two weeks; it was distributed everywhere throughout San Diego. They ran album reviews, show previews, show reviews, band and artist profiles, and so on. Just about every city has such a publication. SLAMM was ours. It was extremely popular. (It was also sold about two years ago.)

As you know if you’ve read some my earlier blogs (which you should go do now!), at the time I became a Christian I was 38 years old, and working as a flunky in a law office. It had recently begun to dawn on me that maybe I shouldn’t be 38 and have a job I could have handled when I was nine–that maybe I should get a real job.

“Time to stop worrying about the art of writing,” I said to myself one day, “and start worrying about finally making a living writing. Cool enough.” Then I said to myself, “Hmm. I’m a law office flunky. No one’s going to pay me to write. I better start writing stuff for free.”

So I submitted a 250-word album review to SLAMM. They ran it. Then I wrote another one. They ran that one, too. Before too long, I was spending my nights writing tons of material for that publication.

Eight months after that my editor got a better job offer, and recommended me to SLAMM’s publisher as his replacement.

And voila: I became a magazine editor.

Who had just become a Christian.

Have you ever heard of singer named Rob Zombie? I have no idea what ol’ Rob is up to these days, but he was/is one of those artists who ground their image and music in Gruesome Death stuff: lots of dripping blood and spooky tombs–and worse. Rob’s albums have titles like “Living Dead Girl,” “Superbeast,” and “The Sinister Urge.” Rob is quite the hero of a significant portion of the death/industrial metal-head set.

Or perhaps you’ve heard of the extremely popular singer/songwriter Marilyn Manson. Mr. Manson’s latest album is called, “Eat Me, Drink Me.” Two of his other big albums are “Smells Like Children,” and “Antichrist Superstar.” He favors a look that says, “Soulless, Bloodless, Androgynous Zombie with Really Red Lips and Hollowed-Out Eyes.” He wears more pancake make-up than Bozo.

Anyway, you get the idea. As you surely know, there are lots of artists like Mr.’s Zombie and Manson: Music racks everywhere are jammed with singers who drench themselves in all kinds of truly gruesome images of death and gore. A great many of them, of course, are exceedingly proud to be associated as clearly as possible with Satan.

Now, my job at SLAMM was to present its audience with the music it wanted to learn about. And at that time Marilyn Manson was wildly popular; he was selling out stadiums all over the world.

And just my luck, he was coming to San Diego.

A weird thing about the music business is the degree to which it’s driven by publicity. I mean, we all know what a media-driven society we live in, but unless you’ve ever actually worked in media, you have no idea. (Or do, I know—since all media ever seems to talk about anymore is media.) If you, reading this right now, typed “The Music Publication” across the top of a piece of paper, wrote a line or two beneath that about how you reviewed albums, and that “MP” was distributed throughout your area, ran off 100 copies of that, and dropped those sheets off at your nearest coffee shop, by the time you got home you’d already have wating for you five messages from five different record labels.

It’s pretty insane like that.

During the time I was at SLAMM, the only artist doing a show in San Diego (and they all do shows in San Diego: Wouldn’t you?) who didn’t make themselves totally available to us for interviews and so on was Bob Dylan. Everyone else, no matter how Humongously Popular they were, contacted us before we even knew they had a local concert scheduled. They all wanted profiles done on them. They all wanted to be on the cover.

And most importantly, they all wanted to let me into their show for free.

Man. Talk about your top-notch perk.

Anyway, I loved that job. Like about everyone, I’m crazy for music. And I was learning so much about it. The “world music” movement was just then taking off; my office was forever filled with African, Irish, and Latin music I was thrilled hear and study. Jazz, rock, blues, experimental … it was just all so great.

Way more than that, even, was that I was doing something I was apparently born to do, which is run a magazine. Freelancers! Photographers! Graphic designers! Salespeople! Advertisers! Headlines! Deadlines! Captions! Covers! Faxes! Phone calls! Interviews!

It was sooooo not standing alone all day in a boiling little room making photocopies for massive corporations determined to make clear to whatever employee had filed a complaint against them that they, the employee, had zero idea with whom they were messing. (You would not believe the resources a huge international corporation will marshal against, say, a single employee who’s filed a sexual harassment suit against the lowest of their managers. They bury that complainer: They do everything they can to make sure that person, and anyone who knows that person, never, ever again entertains the idea off filing a suit against them. And they can do a lot towards that end. It’s actually pretty scary.)

Running a music magazine was a positive dream for me.

And then one day across my desk came the press packet for Marilyn Manson, who was coming soon to San Diego’s largest concert venue. Tickets for that show had gone on sale that morning; they’d sold out in half an hour.

I could “accidentally” lose a Rob Zombie CD that had come in. I could misplace the “Killer Death Mutants” latest disc. I could forget to run that piece about the “Blood Dripping Maniacs” concert. I could completely lose track of the PR material for “Animal Carnage.”

But there was no way I could legitimately “forget” to deal with Marilyn Manson.

My job was to put Marilyn Manson on the cover of my magazine. In a lot of ways, my job was to promote Marilyn Manson.

And there, in the bookcase right next to my desk, was my Bible.

(The follow-up to this post is Lying for Jesus, Pt. 2)

Personal

Previous Post

May 16, 2007

Attack of the Killer Squirrels: The End

Next Post

May 19, 2007 Lying for Jesus, pt. 2

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Christian Issues Christian Spirituality Dear John En Espanol Everywhere She's Not Humor Look See Pastor Bob's Corner Personal Portuguese Relationships Russian Short-short story Smith Family Chronicles Uncategorized

Select a Month March 2024 August 2022 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 February 2020 December 2019 June 2019 December 2018 May 2018 May 2017 January 2017 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who said, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest"?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Moses David Jesus Paul

Books by This Author Books by John Shore

See All Titles »