God bless Warner E. Hodges flipping his Telecaster with Jason & the Scorchers

By Steve Newton

I really admire incredible guitar playing. Sometimes, when I hear a guitar solo that blows me away, I even ask God to bless it.

In previous blogs I’ve asked Him to bless amazing lead breaks by Scott Gorham on Thin Lizzy’s “Romeo and the Lonely Girl”, Donald “Buck Dharma” Roeser on Blue Öyster Cult’s “Burnin’ For You”, Snowy White on Peter Green’s “Slabo Day”, Steve Cropper on Rod Stewart’s “Stone Cold Sober”, and Huey Thomasson on the Outlaws’ “Hurry Sundown”.

Sometimes I’ll even ask God to bless bits of music played on other instruments, like those times I asked Him to bless Chuck Leavell‘s piano solo on the Allman Brothers’ “Southbound”, Ian Paice‘s drumming on Deep Purple’s “Burn”, and Jaco Pastorius‘s bass solo on Ian Hunter‘s “All American Alien Boy”.

But today I came across a guitar player I wasn’t that familiar with, by the name of Warner E. Hodges. He’s released several solo albums, but is best known for his work with pioneering cowpunks Jason & the Scorchers, and also for joining the former frontman for the Georgia Satellites in Dan Baird & Homemade Sin.

Anyway, I didn’t know how totally blessable Hodges was until I watched a 1998 video of Jason & the Scorchers performing “White Lies”, a tune from their 1985 debut album Lost & Found, on TV’s Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

Holy freakin’ crap! If you look up “rock band kicking ass” in the dictionary, you’ll see a screenshot from that clip, because the Nashville quartet tears it up big-time. Fringe-shirted singer Jason Ringenberg is a ball of fire himself, but what steals the show for me is Hodges’ off-the-rails guitar playing and incredible showmanship, which includes spinning around like a top and flipping his Telecaster around his body without missing one raunchy, twang-infested lick.

I hereby ask God to bless that wonderful stunt, and I’m sure that in His infinite wisdom he’ll grant me that request.