Heavy Metal Jesus never misses a good show – and it turns out he’s pretty hard to miss too. His long brown hair and scraggly beard blend easily into the crowds Michael Medford frequents, but add a flowing white tunic tied with a red sash and he stands out.
You may have seen the sanctified Cedar Park resident raging at a heavy metal concert or – as is well documented – in the front row of an All Elite Wrestling show. The home base of Central Texas AEW events is Cedar Park’s H-E-B Center, only a few blocks from Medford’s home. All he has to do is strap on his sandals, pack some beer money, and get walking.
Despite his current commitment to the costume, Medford never intended for Heavy Metal Jesus to be anything other than a one-off. He first dressed up as Jesus around 20 years ago to pass out candy on Halloween. The following year, costumed heavy metal group GWAR, a band he discovered while watching Beavis and Butt-Head, played a show in Dallas, not far from where Medford lived at the time. He figured, why not go dressed up in last year’s Halloween costume? It certainly would stand out from the armored creatures GWAR portrayed.
Jesus outfit half-on and already feeling slightly embarrassed, Medford entered the House of Blues Dallas. He noticed a handful of other audience members in costume – a banana, a witch, and a unicorn, to be specific – but the shy Jesus in the corner drew the most attention. Medford spent a large chunk of the show taking pictures with fellow metalheads who approached him. Afterward, still stunned from his unexpected popularity, a crew member called Medford over and told him to come backstage. The intimidating then-lead singer David Brockie, inhabitant of GWAR character Oderus Urungus, wanted to speak with him.
“I thought I was in trouble,” Medford remembers.
A scolding from Brockie would likely have dissuaded Medford from ever wearing the costume again, but the unmasked frontman wasn’t there to lecture the Jesus in the crowd. In fact, he was just as curious as everyone else. Brockie thought the unusual number of camera flashes coming from the audience were for him – a recognition of the awesome job he was doing. Eventually he realized the flashes were coming from people taking pictures with somebody dressed as Jesus.
“I’m so sorry. I did not mean to step on toes,” Medford told Brockie.
The singer shut down his worries and told him that he actually might be on to something.
GWAR arrived in Dallas the next year for another show around Halloween and, for the first time in a year, Medford donned his Jesus costume. Sure enough, he was called backstage again after the show.
Brockie greeted him with a smile, saying plainly, “If I see you at another show without that on, I’m going to kick your ass.”
And thus, Heavy Metal Jesus was born.
With newfound confidence and a sense of duty, Medford started bringing the character to non-GWAR shows, and much to his gratitude, people kept enjoying it. Once too shy to even enter a club wearing his costume, Medford now steps in confidently, fully decked out.
“Once he puts [the costume] on, he’s this different type of person,” says Erin Patty, who first met Medford at a Black Label Society show 15 years ago.
“Heavy Metal Jesus is Michael turned up to 11,” Medford agrees. “That change hits me and I’m ready to talk to anybody.”
He’s been pulled from the crowd to the stage during concerts with metal heavy-hitters like Pantera and Marilyn Manson, who both likely see the irony in having the lord and savior fist-pumping to music closely associated with sin. But for Medford, it’s simply a good time.
“The first time I ever saw him he was crowd surfing,” current GWAR lead vocalist and bassist Mike Bishop tells the Chronicle over email. “We were playing, and when I looked out at the crowd, there was Jesus getting thrown around on top.”
Metal shows allow Medford a visceral, carnal release, and the persona of Heavy Metal Jesus gives him a chance to mean something more to people than just “Michael.”
“To get in the mosh pit, do some headbanging – it speaks to me in a way that nothing else does,” Medford says – except perhaps the similarly theatrical art of professional wrestling.
Medford grew up watching the WWF with his family during the Attitude Era of the late 1990s and early 2000s. As kids, he and his younger brother Terry would throw their own playful wrestling matches on the trampoline in the backyard.
“Those were some of the best times of my life,” Medford says. “We would wrestle until we couldn’t even get up anymore and just lie there breathing heavy for 10 or 15 minutes, [then] jump up and do it again.”
Around 20 years ago, when Terry was 17, he had an accident that took away most of his physical abilities. On a road trip, he pulled over to the side of the road near the Texas-Oklahoma border due to car trouble. A truck driver, asleep at the wheel, veered off the road and struck his van.
Michael flew to Oklahoma City, where his brother was hospitalized, and stayed by his side while Terry remained unconscious. After two weeks and little progress, Medford returned to Austin for work. The day after he landed home, Terry regained consciousness, but was left quadriplegic.
“The first thing [Terry] asked was, ‘Where’s Mike?’” Medford says.
The Leander High School student spent the remainder of his senior year at the rehabilitation center. Teachers visited and provided lessons to him so he could graduate on time. When Terry was released, it was time for commencement.
Medford remembers the ceremony vividly. Terry’s name was called, and he made his way across the stage, receiving a loud ovation from the crowd at the Frank Erwin Center. Many of the audience members knew his story.
“It was a beautiful moment,” Medford says. “I think that really helped him [get] past the little bit of sadness that he had.”
After leaving the rehabilitation center, Terry asked his brother to help take care of him. Medford agreed and they moved into the same house – though now without a trampoline in the backyard.
The Medfords started going to as many events as they could together, and for the first time, Terry saw the magnetic effect Heavy Metal Jesus had with crowds.
“People just love to interact with him,” the younger Medford says. “Sometimes I’m like, ‘Bro, we [have] to focus on taking care of [me],’ but he [still] always makes sure to support me when I need him.”
At first the brothers rarely went to see pro wrestling, their shared childhood love. Terry thought the modern era of WWE was too hokey, with not enough attention paid to the in-ring competition. But in 2019, Medford began hearing buzz about a new promotion: All Elite Wrestling.
The nascent pro wrestling company announced a pay-per-view event in Las Vegas that summer. Partly because of his brother’s deep love for Sin City, Medford took a chance and bought tickets.
Featured that night was a bout between Cody and Dustin Rhodes – a brother vs. brother match. The emotional battle ended with both competitors covered in each other’s blood. Exhausted, they embraced. Medford, dressed as Heavy Metal Jesus, and his brother did the same.
“I [told] my brother right there, ‘Man, I love you so much,’” Terry said. “I literally was crying in his arms.”
Passion for pro wrestling restored, the brothers started frequenting AEW tapings. They’re regulars on Chris Jericho’s cruise, a voyage filled with wrestling, music, and comedy founded by the legendary athlete and musician.
That’s where they met their friend Jimmy Roberts.
“Terry crashed his chair into my chair,” Roberts, a wheelchair user, recalls. Medford apologized and explained his brother had been pre-gaming.
Familiar with the difficulty of traveling with a disability, Roberts admires the brothers’ commitment to a good time.
“You [have] to make months of planning to make this stuff work,” he says. “He never, to me, has ever shown any kind of resentment or frustration with that. Even in times where Terry’s chair has been demolished by airports, they both come in with a positive attitude.”
The 2020 Jericho cruise is where wrestling fan Alishan Lalani, the Scooby-Doo to Medford’s Jesus, first wore the costume of the mystery-solving cartoon character that briefly put him in the spotlight.
High from his 15 minutes, Lalani bought front-row seats for the AEW show in Cedar Park a few weeks later. Sitting in a section directly across from Lalani, also in the front row, was the shouting and sign-waving Heavy Metal Jesus.
That night’s episode of AEW: Dynamite had the typical twists, turns, and dives that Medford and Lalani love, but the most lasting memory came after the TV cameras went dark. As a bonus match, fans were provided a tag-team match between – at the time – fan-favorite team the Young Bucks and the cardboard cutout heels Q.T. Marshall and Brandon Cutler. This matchup would usually be a vehicle to show off the Young Bucks, but the talent – and a stray Cody Rhodes – had something else in mind.
“I saw [the Young Bucks] talking with Cody, and they’re like, ‘Hey, we should bring in Scooby-Doo,’ and I was like, ‘What are they thinking?’” Lalani remembers.
The wrestlers pulled Scooby-Doo and Jesus into the ring. They stood straight across from their confused competitors, Marshall and Cutler. Playing impromptu referee was Dustin Rhodes, and recording the whole thing on his phone was his brother Cody, less than a year after their emotional match in Las Vegas.
“My heart was beating like crazy, even more than whenever I was onstage with Pantera,” says Medford.
The Young Bucks instructed the costumed pair to watch for a “superkick,” a sidekick to the chin, and then pin their incapacitated opponents for the win.
When Dustin officially started the match, Marshall and Cutler instantly fell into a pair of kicks from the Young Bucks. Medford and Lalani each pinned an opponent for the three count before jumping for joy and joining in a childlike embrace. They like to refer to themselves as “undefeated.”
“We just vibed perfectly,” says Lalani. “Imagine legitimately Shaggy and Scooby-Doo.”
They still keep in contact, sometimes reminiscing about the time an arena of thousands cheered them on. Lalani is just one of many friends Medford has made during his travels as Heavy Metal Jesus, but that doesn’t mean everyone worships at his feet.
A tense interaction at a UFC event stands out in Medford’s memory. “A guy told me I was putting a bad stain on Jesus,” he remembers.
A Christian himself, Medford says his intention is to celebrate Jesus, not mock him.
“Before I go out, I always say a prayer and say, ‘Let me represent him in the proper way,’” he explains. “I’m not the real guy. I’m just a big fan.”
Also included in the long list of followers Heavy Metal Jesus has gathered along his travels is fellow GWAR superfan Byron Bassett.
“He’s genuinely a good person,” Bassett says. Medford helped Bassett gain the confidence to fully embody “Humongous Fungus of Urungus,” a GWAR-inspired character adorned with monstrous armor, skulls, and Sharpie-drawn abs.
When Bassett debuted Humongous Fungus 10 years ago at a GWAR-B-Q in Richmond, Virginia, he came face-to-face with Heavy Metal Jesus and they quickly bonded, their interaction culminating in an impromptu wrestling match.
“I was seeing somebody doing what I wanted to do: being a character and going out and [making] people laugh and [have] fun,” Bassett says. “I [realized] the power of that.”
Heavy Metal Jesus and Humongous Fungus made a cameo together in the second issue of their favorite band’s official comic book, GWAR: Orgasmageddon. The admiration between Medford and the gore metalers is now mutual.
“I have always appreciated Michael,” says Bishop of GWAR. “There are several people that dress like Jesus, and a couple even have the hair and the beard, but Michael looks the most genuine, or at least the most like what white motherfuckers imagine Jesus looks [like].”
Bassett, host of a weekly YouTube show as his character, had Heavy Metal Jesus “bless” one of his recent livestreams.
“He’s been really busy with [his] family, but he always makes time to check in with his friends,” Bassett says.
Medford really is busy with family. He lives with his wife and 6-year-old son in Cedar Park. He still takes care of his brother full time, but now Terry stays about five houses down with another caretaker.
In February, Medford celebrated his 48th birthday with family and friends at a karaoke bar near his home. Terry sang some Eminem and Dr. Dre, and Medford tried out the Darkness’ glam rock anthem “I Believe in a Thing Called Love” and the brooding Metallica cover of “Turn the Page.” The chorus to the latter fittingly goes, “Here I am, on the road again/ There I am, up on the stage.”
Raising his little one has caused Medford to lighten his schedule in recent years, but even as life evolves, he has no plans to retire his beloved alter ego – though he may need to alter it eventually.
“I’ve been telling my wife lately that if I get too old,” he laughs, “I might have to switch to Heavy Metal Moses with the white hair and some Ten Commandments.”
This article appears in March 20 • 2026.