words and video by Nickolai Hammar | photos by Jon Augustine

Darren Keen, an old friend of the Lincoln music scene, graced the stage one last time as The Show Is The Rainbow at The Bourbon Theatre on Sunday night.

His mother, Judy, said, “(Darren) just told me, I love everybody in this room.”

Darren meant it, too, when he said he was going to be talking a lot on stage that night. He shared inside jokes with one or two audience members and anecdotes from his decade performing as TSITR, which he says came to an end.

Keen put on an amazing first show for some, delivered a nostalgic performance for prior TSITR fans and celebrated his 30th birthday by throwing drinks onto the crowd after hand-feeding his cake to others. He intentionally fell backwards into the mass of outstretched hands then later came off the stage saying he thought he was going to cry all night.

Judy Keen said through some tears of her own that, “Darren doesn’t care if he’s playing for three people or 300. He puts everything into every show.”

“They’re all old friends, bandmates, people who have been coming to his shows for years,” she continued. “I hope he comes away realizing people have appreciated all the hard work he’s putting into those shows.”

See more photos here.

Nickolai Hammar is a Hear Nebraska intern-to-be, and Jon Augustine is an HN contributor. This is the trial-by-fire story we assigned during our interview with Nickolai. His work, interview, goals and portfolio earned him a spot on our team starting in January 2013. To join him this spring, see HN's internship details here.

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