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Touring Is A Family Affair For Delirious? (The Post and Courier)
Last modified: 12 Apr 2007

Source: The Post and Courier
Author: Keith Ryan Cartwright
Date: 12 Apr 2007

They're bona fide rock stars the world over.

So why then are the members of Delirious? - Martin Smith, Stuart Garrard, Jon Thatcher, Tim Jupp and Stew Smith - as inclined to talk about waking up in the morning to a crying child and toddlers anxious for breakfast as they are setlists or meet-and-greets? Perhaps the 15-year veterans of Christian rock are back home in the UK. enjoying some down time.

After all, you don't just pack up the kids and head out for an afternoon trip to the zoo without methodically planning what is sure to be a nonstop adventure. Then again Delirious? is a different kind of band, to say the least, so maybe - just maybe - they're not at home.

"Our life is not just one of being on the road," said Jupp, who just three weeks ago was hospitalized for eight days and underwent two appendectomy surgeries. "It was quite a messy time. I'm not actually sure I'm supposed to be out here now."

He is - Jupp joined the band and the rest of the extended family last week - and the group is in the midst of another tour - "Worship Revolution" - that wraps up tonight with a show at Charleston Southern University, where the band will co-headline with Rebecca St. James.

Parked outside the arena will be four custom tour buses, two of which house 10 adults - the five members of Delirious? and their spouses - along with a grand total of 16 kids between the ages of 1 and 16 (and, as Jupp noted, "nearly every age in between").

"It is very unusual," admitted Jupp, of the band's choice to tour with their families. "You don't know what it's doing to (the children). It's definitely having a profound impact. They're world traveled.

"I wouldn't be surprised if when they grow up they all find themselves in different parts of the world. They're being exposed to quite a bit."

Admittedly, bring the kids stateside, which they've previously done, is like "one big holiday" for them, so later this summer the parents intend to take the entire clan to Asia so that the children, who have been afforded a privileged lifestyle, can experience firsthand "more difficult situations."

"The strength that keeps us together is the fact that we're a family," said Jupp, of Delirious?' longevity. "We communicate and we look out for one another.

"We try and do at least one trip together each year ? so (the family) can better understand what it's like for us the rest of the year."

The band got its start in '93 when the four brother-in-laws - Jupp and both Smiths are each married to one of Thatcher's three sisters - formed a worship band for a youth outreach event - "Cutting Edge" - in their hometown of Littlehampton, West Sussex, England.

Four years and four EPs later, the band decided to pursue its career professionally, and began releasing a succession of what would eventually become nine full-length studio albums - not including last year's DVD, "Now is the Time: Live at Willow Creek," which came packaged with a live CD - that not only established the group as major draw throughout the UK and Europe, but also solidified the band as a viable alternative rock band in America and the rest of world.

Sonically the sound is an amalgamation of old U2 and current Coldplay, but with albums like 2005's "The Mission Bell" the band's emphasis is, and always has been, the messages of worship heard throughout much of their song selection. In any case, for Delirious?, this particular tour is less about career initiatives and more about family.

"We take things easy when the families are here," said Jupp, who noted that in spite of this particular interview, everyone's focus is a day-trip to the San Diego Zoo. "I guess we're burning the candle at both ends of the day."





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