Sacred or profane, it’s still country to them

IN country music, when you are down you turn either to drink or to God.

Can the two go together? That’s duo Big & Rich’s take with a song titled “What Would Jesus Drink?”

“Jesus didn’t turn the water into Dr Pepper, did he?” says John Rich, who partners with “Big” Kenny Alphin in the act.

But that might be a bit much even for these guys, who established a reputation for rowdiness and boundary-pushing last year with their “Horse of a Different Color” album, the “Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)” single and by introducing “hick-hop” rapper Cowboy Troy to the world. Big & Rich decided not to put that song on their second album, tentatively titled “Big & Rich: Now in Technicolor” and due Nov. 15.

“We’re still in a phase with country radio where a lot of them are still making up their minds about us,” Rich says. “We sold almost 3 million of our first album without a Top 5 country radio hit. I guess that’s something to brag about, but we want country radio to play our music, and I’m not sure they understand our sense of humor enough to understand ‘What Would Jesus Drink?’ ”

The song is a honky-tonk satire in the tradition of Shel Silverstein or Kinky Friedman, with a chorus that asks:

What would Jesus drink?

Probably red, red wine

If He was missing you

And losing his mind

Rich says the song got a thumbs-up from his father, who is a preacher. But they still opted to wait awhile before unleashing it on the world.

“There are plenty of songs on the album to make you look twice without that one,” he says. “A lot of people could take it the wrong way. It’ll be a great song for the third album.”

Brian Phillips, senior vice president and general manager of the country music cable channel CMT, thinks that’s smart.

“I would expect nothing less from them than that idea,” he says. “But that’s one that might have to sit in the ether for a while.”

Even without the song, the album will further Big & Rich’s reputation for mixing sacred with profane and somber with rowdy and for their unconventional blend of arena rock, funk and even rap, all filtered through an irreverent country sensibility.

The first single from the new album will be “Coming to Your City,” a shout-out singalong that is going to be used as ESPN’s college football theme song throughout the coming season. Another certain to draw a lot of attention is “8th of November,” a tribute to Vietnam War hero Lawrence Joel (the first living African American to be awarded the Medal of Honor since the Spanish-American War) and Neil Harris, a friend of Big & Rich who served alongside Joel.

“Harris is the guy who gave Big Kenny his top hat,” Rich says. “Wheels are already in motion to do a movie.”

It’s all a continuation of what they established last year.

“The first album was controversial and also combined a lot of different kinds of music under the umbrella of ‘Country Music Without Prejudice,’ ” he says. “We write our songs about our lives and how we live. We party harder than most people, but we have serious things we run into, like the Vietnam vet.”

The dynamics extend beyond the album. The two recently filmed a concert in Deadwood, S.D., that will air as part of a CMT special in October. They’ve been touring steadily since before the last album came out (they’ll be at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Irvine on Oct. 22).

And their Muzik Mafia coalition of Nashville outsiders continues to have a wide reach, with Rich repeating his role as producer and songwriter for party girl Gretchen Wilson’s upcoming second album, as well as writing songs for such other country stars as Faith Hill.

And despite their caution about “What Would Jesus Drink?,” they are looking to other barriers they can break.

“We’ve got crazy notions of going out and doing a tour with the Black Eyed Peas, a completely cross-genre tour, maybe Nelly and Big & Rich and Willie Nelson,” Rich says. “That’s probably a couple of years from coming to pass, but those are the visions we have.”

Back O.N. the scene for a night

ONE of L.A.’s most influential ‘80s rock clubs is reopening -- though for just one night.

The O.N. Club, which from 1980 to 1983 served as the center of the vibrant local ska and “two-tone” scene as well as hosting punk and new wave acts, will have a 25th anniversary concert and party at its original location in Silver Lake as the opening night event of the Music in Film Festival on Oct. 6.

Club founder Howard Paar got the notion when he found himself nearby the old locale on Sunset recently and realized that the 25th anniversary was looming.

“I subsequently drove by and saw a phone number -- it’s a construction company now -- and I called and asked the owner to indulge me while I explained, [because I thought] it wouldn’t make any sense. He stopped me halfway though and said, ‘I used to go to your club,’ ” says Paar, who went on to work as a record company publicist and now is a music supervisor for such film soundtracks as the recent “Herbie: Fully Loaded” and the upcoming movie about L.A. punk band the Germs.

Paar hopes to evoke the environment of the club that one night featured an onstage jam of members of the Clash and the English Beat and hosted visits from such international acts as the Specials. Plans are to assemble members of such O.N. regulars as the Box Boys, the Untouchables and the Babylon Warriors as a house band for the evening with various guest singers. (Interested musicians or others can e-mail him at hpaar@emotomusic.com.)

Given the club’s relatively short life, Paar has been gratified over the years at how many people have told him they attended shows there.

“There have been many people I had no idea were there,” he says. “Jodie Foster told me she went. I guess we didn’t pay much attention at the time.”

Small Faces

* In addition to working on her own album, Christina Aguilera has a version of Leon Russell’s “A Song for You” for Herbie Hancock’s album “Possibilities,” featuring collaborations with Carlos Santana, John Mayer, Sting and others and due Aug. 30....

* John Wesley Harding has written a series of songs tied to the new Victorian comic novel “Misfortune” by Wesley Stace and has assembled a group, the Love Hall Tryst, to perform them in English folk-harmony style. The material is on a new album being released by Appleseed Records, and the Tryst will be at McCabe’s on Aug. 28. Conveniently, Harding and Stace are the same person....