newsboys

Fresh Sounds, Pure Hearts: THE NEWSBOYS

Come early, stay late, and party long with newsboys as they rock their way into The Theatre at the Frank Erwin Center as part of their “GO” tour on Saturday, October 20!

The newsboys formed in Australia in 1985 and have been one of the most popular and best selling Christian music bands ever since. The band’s original name was The News, but once in the US they changed it to the newsboys to avoid conflict with another US based band. The band is comprises of Peter Furler, Jeff Frankenstein, Duncan Philips and Paul Colman. It was not until late in 1992 when these four guys released their first album, Not Ashamed, that the band gained fame in the music scene. In 1994, the band released their fifth album, Going Public, which was their first smash success. The album proved to be a defining moment for the group winning them a Dove Award for “Rock Album of the Year.” Now their latest album, GO, is doing wonders and illustrates the accomplishments this group has made over the last decade.

Fourteen albums ago, long before a separate culture was established to house the bands which would follow in their footsteps, the newsboys began with a single motivation. They sought to play music nourished with life and hope for all who would listen, for all those who most needed to hear it. They first performed for open ears at shaggy bars and grimy night clubs in their native Australia. And newsboys used this environment as a stepping stone to create a vision that would carry newsboys across international barriers of language, culture and race.

“We played a show in Morocco not long ago for about 15,000 Muslims, and it was like something out of Indiana Jones,” Fuler states. “Snake charmers, people eating eyeballs, etc. This is a place where the name of Jesus will get you killed! Nevertheless, His name went out subtly through our songs, and when it did it was probably the loudest His name had been spoken there in ages. It’s a dark place, for certain. But we were able to love these people by just living with them for a few days. That’s what it’s about.”

For inspiration when writing Go, Furler didn’t turn to his record collection, the radio or mainstream outlets such as MTV. Instead, he just wrote music, alone, in his own mind. And if you ask him about this unique approach, he will tell you that his biggest influence after fourteen albums is himself. Furler used his past life lessons to provide leadership to his band in order for them to grow and prosper together.

“If you aren’t making music from the right place, then it won’t be authentic, people will not connect with it, and your record will be sitting on a shelf. On the other hand, if you write from that place of true passion, without trying to make something commercial or forced, then the result will be natural. People will be drawn to it,” Furler explains.

Go, though pop in formation and sensibility, is a very rhythmic approach to the newsboys sound. Beat, bass and melody drive these songs. There are delicacies of urban influence, with the memorable choruses you have come to expect from this quintet. This is the band at their most confident; the record sounds like guys who are as excited as they have ever been to play, to sing. It is as if they have just begun!

“It seems to me there are three types of believers in this world,” Furler concludes. “There is the judgmental guy who spends most of his energy pointing out what is wrong around him and doing very little about it. There is the backslidden guy, who wallows in his own failures. Then there is the real guy, who just tries to love other people and be about the kingdom more than anything else. I want to be the third guy. I want to be known for loving others of different backgrounds and different beliefs no matter the cost.”

Also touring with the newsboys is the Portland, Oregon-based fivesome Kuteless, and Canadian soul, funk, reggae and gospel band, newworldson.