New York -- Sparrow recording group Newsboys completed their history-makng "Love Liberty Disco" national tour on Sunday in West Palm Beach, Florida The tour which began in Ft. Myers on February 18, saw the Christian rockers travel to 67 cities. In doing so. Newsboys became the first musical act in history to bring their own arena on tour with them.

The venue took on the form of an inflatable air dome arena, which literally stays aloft with air that's pumped in with two jet-engine turbine fans. The blow-up arena was first introduced at the Olympic Games in Atlanta, and holds roughly 4000 people, is fully air conditioned, completely self contained, has a four sided stage, is fitted for 150,000 watts of sound and 1 000,000 watts of lighting, takes 50 crew members to set up, and reqwres 7 tractor trailers to travel from city to city. Newsboys contracted two of the arenas for the tour to "leap frog" from city to city to assure extra time for setup.

"We didn't know what to expect heading into it," says Newsboys singer Peter Furler. "By traveling with our own venue, so many things were different. The best was that we were so close to the audience, because it had a tour-sided stage and no one in the audience was more than 80 feet from us What was most unusual was that we literally periormed on the same stage every night for four months."

The national tour, which ended in Florida, sold out 30 shows, nearly half of the tour. Over the four months, the average attendance was 75% of capacity, or about 2700 fans

Was Campbell, The group's manager, said, "The tour was a tremendous success, not only financially, but also because Newsboys opened up a whole new avenue in the concert industry. We've had a lot of interest across musical genres in touring with an air dome arena."

As a result of this history making tour," adds Campbell, "Newsboys also received a tremendous amount of media exposure, including an Associated Press feature that's run in 400 newspapers to date. This, along with national television, has also contributed to a considerably higher level of general market album sales."

In addition, MusicForce.com, a popular Internet music site, taped Newsboys' entire MinniapoIis show and aired it in its entirety at the close of the tour. Thousands of fans signed on to watch the Internet broadcast.

The Outback-originated Newsboys stand as one of today's most promising, enduring bands, earning three Grammy nominations (for 1993's Not Ashamed, Going Public In 1995 and Take Me to Your Leader in 1996). Their lush, catchy sound has captivated many listeners over the last ten years, winning a string of other accolades, including four Dove Awards, two Grammy nominations and three gold records. Formed in Australia in 1988 by vocalist Peter Furler, the band also features guitarist Jody Davis, bassist Phil Joel, keyboardist Jeff Frankenstein and drummer Duncan Phillips.

From www.newsboys.com