MercyMe

Switching positions
By MATT ELLIOT World Scene Writer
2/16/2007

Audio Adrenaline's farewell tour marks another mile post for MercyMe

Those attending Friday's MercyMe concert might catch a glimpse of a strange twist of fate involving two popular Christian bands.
The pop/rock act MercyMe will headline the Mabee Center show instead of their friends Audio Adrenaline.
It was Audio Adrenaline who gave MercyMe its kickstart while Audio Adrenaline was at its zenith, said MercyMe's bassplayer, Nathan Cochran.
This tour with MercyMe is Audio Adrenaline's swan song.
The two bands have sold more than 7 million albums, and MercyMe, nominated for a Grammy this year, is no longer the young pup.
"It's pretty cool," Cochran said. "We kind of in some ways got our kind of a kickstart with them and they're saying goodbye with us." Audio Adrenaline first let MercyMe, which formed in the mid-1990s, open a concert a few years back at Shawnee's Oklahoma Baptist University.
MercyMe debuted on INO Records in 2001 after it had spent its career playing church camps and worship services.
"We plugged away at it for years, doing everything on our own pretty much, from setting up our equipment to driving our own bus. Everything you can imagine, we were doing it
all," Cochran said.
The band developed a big guitar-driven sound that came together on last year's arena-rock-like disc, "Coming Up to Breathe," which received a Grammy nomination for best pop/contemporary gospel album.
That success came despite the fact that Audio Adrenaline's members encouraged MercyMe to stay in the camp circuit, said Audio Adrenaline bassist Will McGinniss.
McGinniss remembers his band telling MercyMe, "(If) you go to a label . . . you're going to not make near as much money and you're going to have to sell a ton more records to sustain where you are now.'
"But eventually they just kept plugging away at it and wrote some big songs," McGinniss said.
But back to Audio Adrenaline, which released "Adios" last August as a greatest-hits album. That capped off a recording career that earned the group two Grammy awards for rock gospel album of the year. The band also has won four Dove awards, Christian music's equivalent to the Grammys.
This tour (Tulsa is the first date) will take the groups on a month-long romp with shows spaced out to give vocalist Mark Stuart's voice a rest.
Stuart suffers a vocal condition in which the sides of his throat are constantly swollen from singing, which hampers his ability to reach the notes, McGinniss said. The band first noticed it about four years ago.
"We tried to squeeze as much more out of it as we could I think," said McGinniss, laughing. "But, he just got to a point where, you know, we just thought he might lose his voice completely and thought it was a really unfair price for him to pay to just keep the band going. We're all getting up there in age anyway."
So the band decided to bow out while at the top of their game, McGinniss said, ending it all in a three night and four-day celebration set April 26-30 in Hawaii.
The fans have been forgiving and understanding of Stuart's condition, McGinniss said.
"I can't imagine having your instrument just taken from you like that. And he's really positive about it and really just gives a thousand percent, you know. It's amazing to see it . . . I think I would be . . . a lot whinier about it," he said.
Audio Adrenaline might get back together in the future, possibly in 2008, McGinniss said. McGinniss said such a reunion would be designed to raise money for the band's ministry, Hands & Feet Project, which helps children in Haiti.
Meanwhile, MercyMe soon will begin working on its follow up to "Coming Up to Breathe," taking another the music up another notch in big guitar-driven pop, McGinniss said.
"We hope and pray that people are being affected in positive ways by our music. We'll keep doing this. I don't think we're going to be the Rolling Stones of Christian music . . . I don't want to have to be rolled on stage to play," he said.
MERCYME When: 6 p.m. Friday, with opening acts Audio Adrenaline and Aaron Shust
Where: Mabee Center, 81st and Lewis Avenue
Tickets: $15 to $31.25, available at www.mabeecenter.com, 800-6781353, 495-6000.