Bushnel, IL
Announcer: Hey, we need to give a big welcome to Rich Mullins!
(applause and cheers from audience)
Hello!
[Hello Old Friends]
(crowd cheers to piano intro into "Sing Your Praise to the Lord")
[Sing Your Praise to the Lord]
Thank you very much! Does anybody have a pick on 'em? Well, I'm having a little guitar trouble here... (strums guitar, tuning) Well, we're gonna be terribly out of tune here, I have a feeling (strumming)... But this is sort of a 'hillbilly' song so I don't suppose it really matters.
[Where You Are]
[Brothers Keeper]
All right, this song will sound a lot better if you sing along with me. (crowd cheers) And we're gonna do it in an 'old church' kind of way, we're gonna line it out. Which means, I will sing a line to you, and then you will sing a line out to God. ( to the side) Could you turn my keyboard and my vocal up just a bit in the monitor so I can tell what I'm doing here?
[I See You]
That was Aaron on the drums, Aaron Smith! (cheers) And you guys sing great! And we're so glad you do. This is Jimmy Abegg. (cheers) Thank you!
Jimmy: Well, we're gonna do a song about a dream I had.
[The Dream]
Another song from Jimmy.
Jimmy: Well, I'm gonna do this song - it's kinda odd. I gotta tell ya, it' so new, that I don't really know it. I hope you don't mind. We're gonna give it our best shot. (strums guitar) This is about an alien abduction. You know, there's a new record out I want to tell you about, it's by ESA, Evangelicals for Social Action. I think it's called Demonstrations of Love, if you've heard of it. So anyway, all these friends of ours, all contributed a song to help support ESA's efforts. And this song is on it, among many others. Rich has got one, Rick, and Mark? No, Mark doesn't. (feedback squeal) I guess that might be this guitar? No, I don't know what it is. Anyway, here we go.
[Aliens]
Jimmy: He put me up to this! (pointing at Rich)
(dulcimer intro into "Calling Out Your Name" - audience cheers)
[Calling Out Your Name]
[How To Grow Up Big And Strong]
All right, here's another one you gotta sing on! (cheers) I'm gonna sing a line to you, and you answer, ok? These lyrics are real easy, they're just, "Whoaaaa" (audience answers back throughout a chorus of "whoa's", becomes intro into 'Place To Stand')
[Place To Stand]
Thank you! (crowd cheers) Well, that's a...that's a song I wrote for a wedding I never had. (he laughs)
[The Color Green]
Thank you. Well, you... Let's see, you've met Jimmy and Aaron so far, I'd also like to introduce Mark Robertson. (crowd cheers) This is the only guy I haven't introduced you to so far, but I'm gonna have to sooner or later, even though it will probab ly ruin my reputation. This is Rick Elias. (cheers)
Rick: Well, we're gonna have a little bit of fun for a second here, ok? You guys ready to dance? (cheers)
[Dance With Me Tonight]
(intro to "That Thing You Do")
Rick: Come on, let's see you do the 'Swim' out there!
[That Thing You Do]
Rick: Well, thank you. Rich is always so generous to let us perform some of our stuff. We're gonna be doing another record up here in the fall (tuning) and the next few songs are songs that will be on that record. This is a song I wrote a few years ago. (Blows harmonica, audience cheers) We're getting there as fast as we can (directed to someone off stage). We love to sing our songs, but we've got a time limit. And we should. We should have a time limit. This song is called, "Man of No Reputa tion." It's taken from Philippians chapter 2, and I wrote it because the phrase stuck with me - you know, it just began to occur to me simply that the Jesus Paul is talking about is not the Jesus that is, more often than not, presented via the airwave s or elsewhere. And it wasn't the Jesus that changed my life, that I came to worship. So...
[Man of No Reputation]
Rick: Thank you very much!
(Rich begins intro on piano into "Jesus")
Here's another song we're putting on the new release. This I wrote because it's easy to look at Jesus as...as either being very imminent or being very "way out there." And, when you love somebody, you want to be with them. And one of the things that 's hard in our lives, is that we're so bad at loving. So this is just a prayer.
[Jesus]
Thank you. (looks behind him on stage, calls by whistle) They're all...they've taken off and left me! (playing intro into "Sometimes By Step") This is a song I wrote with Beaker, who is a good friend of mine, and Beaker's doing great! He is now the father of two children. And if you know this one and you want to sing it, that would be great!
[Sometimes By Step]
(intro into "Creed" on dulcimer, crowd cheers)
[Creed]
God bless you all! Thank you so much! Good night!
(Ragamuffins exit, audience cheers)
Announcer: Good night!
(crowd still cheering, Ragamuffins return)
Thank you! Well, we didn't mean to do another one, because there are two things that are happening at midnight that I think are gonna be really good. One is, the Vigilantes are playing, and I don't want you to miss that. But if you do miss that, I want it to be because you go to see Canticle of the Plains. Here's a song that we forgot to do - we didn't save it for an encore, 'cause we don't normally get asked to do encores.
[Awesome God]
Thank you and good night!
