Amazon offers
Here in America (Bonus DVD) (Audio CD),06 May, 2003
List price $18.98
Don't buy this for the music . . . / 5
About the title of this review . . . it may seem a bit strange for me to reccomend that you not buy a CD or DVD of one of Christian music's top (if not the top) singer and songwriters for the music. However, the Here in America set is not really about the music, though there is plenty of music to enjoy. Indeed, there are a great number of Rich's greatest songs on the CD and (especially) the DVD for your listening pleasure, even a few rarities like Rich's demo on the CD for the song Debby Boone would eventually record, "O Come All Ye Faithful" (no, not the Christmas hymn). The DVD also features great renditions of Rich's top songs performed live with the Ragamuffin Band, refreshingly escaping the over-production most of them recieved on their recorded versions.The highlights come not in the wonderful songs, though. Let's face it, all of the "live" songs on the CD itself were recorded on cassette tape and are of no better sound quality (actually sometimes worse) than the tape demos on the Jesus Record, though the handful of song demos on this CD are of good quality. No, the highlights come in-between the songs on the CD and DVD, when Rich Mullins shows us his heart and his uncanny, if simple, wisdom. From his sometimes quirky, sometimes heart-rending, and always thought-provoking anecdotes to his blunt, straight-to-the-punch one-liners and mini-sermons, this set shows us just what kind of prophet God sent us in the unlikely form of an unglamorized 80s-90s Christian pop icon. Of course, Rich was much different than the others in his genre. He made no secret of his many faults. He prefered to live on a very meager budget and help those in need than to make the possible millions he could have made off of his every hit record and over twenty chart-topping singles. He was not afraid, either, as this rare audio and video footage clearly shows, to express his opinion of any issue, sensitive or not, which he felt strongly about concerning God or the Church. Rich Mullins was a great songwriter, and a person of unlikely wisdom and courage in a day and age where the truth of God is being constantly watered down by a much astray Church. Rich has inspired a legacy, though, and the spiritual seeds God planted through him now have made their way into the churches and into even the Christian music mainstream. If you want to see and hear a bit from the heart of Rich Mullins, I encourage you to get this CD and DVD set. You will be enlightened, inspired, maybe a little ruffled, but you will certainly not be disappointed.
Song "Promenade"
When the dancers took to the promenade
Well my heart leapt high
And I was unafraid
Of the feeling I'd stifled for so many years
Tell me how do you
How do you feel
Well the band took their places and got all in tune
And then the caller's voice
Well it rang out beneath the moon
And then the boys took their girls and they started to reel
And they were singin' how do you, how do you feel
And then the people in the town said that they'd call the police
If we didn't keep down all this disturbin' their peace
And Officer Black, you know he answered their pleas
And he ran up on the hill just to see
Well he hid in the bushes just a stone's throw away
And then we all saw this change comin' over his face
But he was bouncin' to the beat and started hoppin' on his heels
Singin', how do you do, how do you feel
And then the townspeople asked him if he'd make some arrests
Could they find peace and quiet so they could go back to bed
He said if it's peace that you want, you're gonna find it on the hill
But the silence that you keep is the silence that kills
So the townspeople all got so uptight and mad
You know they fired him on the spot
And then they threw away his badge
Then they asked him to leave and he said gladly I will
They said tell us now how do you feel
He said, when the dancers took to the promenade
Well my heart leapt high and I was unafraid
Of the feeling I'd stifled for so many years
Tell me how do you, how do you feel
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