Muse’s Will of the People World tour, in support of the band’s album of the same name, is nearing the end of the fourth leg in U.S. arenas. The tour began in January 2023 in Mexico and will wrap in Europe in July 2023. The Will of the People tour takes a stark look at a looming post-apocalyptic world through its words and music. The powerful production design has garnered a lot of positive attention from both fans and the live entertainment industry for reflecting the band’s vision. Once again, Muse and the design team pushed the creative boundaries with the tour’s visual landscape.
PLSN caught up with some of the creative team behind this dynamic design including Creative Director and Co-Production Designer, Jesse Lee Stout of Metaform Studio; Lighting Designer and Co-Production Designer, Sooner Routhier principal of Sooner Rae Creative; and Associate Lighting Designer and Programmer, Aaron Luke of Luminescence. Stout started out working with Muse in 2015 as the Video + Interactive Content Director and then moved into designing / creative directing in 2018. Routhier has been designing for Muse since the fall of 2018 and Luke began working with Muse in 2019. The three shared some insights into their work supporting Muse’s creative vision and some of the solutions they brought to touring challenges.
PLSN: What was the design aesthetic that you felt was right to support Muse’s music?
Jesse Lee Stout: The band and I really wanted to go a very different direction from their previous tour, to give this one its own identity. We developed a post-apocalyptic near-future world as a metaphor for our ‘New Normal’. In the past couple years, a pandemic wreaked havoc, an insurrection stormed the capital, anonymous activist hackers attacked governments and corporations, and people began tearing down monuments across the globe. We all quickly grew accustomed to wearing masks and proposed a story of an extreme group of vigilantes resetting the world to ground zero.
Sooner Routhier: After pouring through the creative direction for the new album cycle, we worked together to create a rig that feels like the skeletal nature of a post-apocalyptic, near-future world. The rig consists of grids of the same lights that put the band inside a deconstructed building; simplistic, industrial, and homogeneous. This became the visual identity of the tour we did in the fall of 2022 and carried through into the arena tour in 2023.
How much do you collaborate with the band on the design?
JLS: The band loved my inflatable from the Simulation Theory tour and wanted to revisit that with our current characters for this cycle. The main character ‘Will’ who’s in a black hoodie and mirror mask was developed early on when the album was being made. We talked about masks in those early sessions, and I immediately knew I wanted a mirror mask. There’s something really intimidating about looking at someone and seeing your own reflection staring back at you—the highway patrol wearing mirror aviators know this.
How do the design choices facilitate keeping the show’s looks fresh throughout the performance?
JLS: I’m always conscious about creating visually defined acts in a show. Matt (Bellamy) is always mindful about highlighting the band’s new songs—giving those special effects or a memorable “moment” in the show. Sooner and I worked on pacing, restraint in fixture use, etc. It was hard to hold off on the moving mirrors until act 3, but it’s a massive surprise for the audience that’ve been watching the performance for 50 minutes and then a colossal transformation occurs with what appears to be a fixed set piece.
SR: Jesse does an amazing job of pushing us to create different looks for each song. He’s great at asking us to go even further than we are already pushing ourselves. He also has an incredible way of looking at a lighting rig in a different way. We treat every song as if it is its own art piece and we try not to repeat the look in any other songs in the set. For example, one song is “the pyramid song,” another is “the grid song,” there is the “floating cube song,” etc. We push to use the lighting and scenic features differently throughout the show.
Aaron Luke: As Jesse mentioned, the show is broken up into defined acts. The songs within each act may have something that ties them together, such as a set piece or an automation component, so we relied on other tools to create unique looks within those subsets. This was anything from differing fixture selection groups to repeating focus positions as little as possible. Joe, Sooner, and Jesse did a great job of creating several distinct looks rather than just recycling the same handful of positions. In the first days of the tour, it challenged me as the operator to make sure every position was correct on a day-to-day basis, but in the end, I think the work is certainly justified by the energy and reactions of the crowd.
How do your key gear choices support the versatility in your design?
JLS: I wanted to make sure we had the right firepower in the lighting to create eye-popping mirror bounces of light. Sooner knew the exact fixtures that would do the job. I was also tired of seeing overhead lighting rigs pointing down at the stage floor. Therefore, we made the stage deck clear and put the overhead rig under the stage. This helped create the industrial looking floor that I wanted and created much taller beams too, hitting the venue ceiling. It was a win-win.
SR: Trying to have a homogenous system was very important to us. We made sure there were a lot of the same type of lights so that the lighting looks could be varied, but still have the same visual lighting vocabulary across the show. We also wanted the entire system to feel clean. We maintained the cleanliness of the system by keeping all floor lights under the plexi stage and removing a lighting rig from above the stage.
AL: In addition to the consideration of horsepower and features, a big consideration for this tour was ruggedness. After this U.S. leg of the tour, we will be heading to Europe to do outdoor shows in stadiums and at festivals. As rain is often a big part of touring in Europe, it was important that we have fixtures that could hold their own in a downpour and to not have to send climbers up every day to replace fixtures. Because of that, something like 90% of the rig is IP rated.
Is there a particular solution you are pleased with in the show?
SR: The mirror boxes filled with [GLP] JDC Lines and flame units are incredible. We are able to achieve extremely unique looks with automation for that section of the show. They also keep the air clean of trussing, cables, and fixtures.
How was working with the various vendors and their support?
SR: Upstaging always goes above and beyond. for both lighting and scenic elements. The support and relationships that we’ve built with Josh Wagner, John Huddleston, and John Bahnick have ensured the success of the creative for the tour. In the beginning of the year, we needed to test mirror samples with the [Claypaky] Xtylos to ensure we were getting the most reflectivity we could out of the mirror boxes. They set up the test and proceeded to send mirror samples to the house so that we could play with them in pre viz.
AL: Upstaging always does a fantastic job at providing both quality gear as well as fantastic service. They are always willing to work with us on finding solutions to all of those little unforeseen things that tend to come up. As the Xtylos is somewhat of a unique fixture with the laser engine, Upstaging had someone from their team at rehearsals to assist the lighting crew, as well as myself, with learning the ‘personalities’ of those fixtures. Couple this with the support of George Masek from Claypaky, I felt like I had a team I could turn to, to get the most from the fixtures.
JLS: The Nighthawk team have been great. Always accommodating. [For special effects] ER is always down to try different approaches to an idea in order to make it work. Also, Gallagher really helped this stage come together. They were on time and very helpful throughout the process.
What is something you think might be interesting to other production professionals?
JLS: Our upstage lighting wall is on an oval-shaped track that works to hide part of the upstage while the inflatables are being built. Most of the audience doesn’t even realize the upstage is being hidden twice in the show, since the stage looks unchanged, just marginally shallower.
AL: As a touring LD, we used to be able to get away with small variations in fixtures being level relative to one another since the larger beam angles allowed for a certain amount of visual forgiveness. But now, as more and more tight-beam fixtures make their way onto the market and gain popularity, the responsibility of updating focus positions becomes even more important. With 152 [Claypaky] Xtylos and the time constraints of having two opening acts, it was crucial for me to find ways to quickly update each day. A major part of my workflow is a LUA plugin for MA by Giaffo Designs that allows me to quickly put in offsets to the fixtures which saves a ton of time.
A Workhorse in the Design
Key to helping Routhier realize the lighting design were 122 CHAUVET Professional Color STRIKE M fixtures, which, like the rest of the rig were supplied by Upstaging. The vast majority of these motorized strobes are positioned in a horseshoe configuration around the stage, while 32 units are located under the plexiglass stage, with a few others placed on a truss in the house for audience lighting.
“The STRIKE Ms in the horseshoe configuration around the stage help us create the wall of light around the band,” said Routhier. “They are one of the main workhorses of the show. The units in the upstage row under the stage are usually used to uplight the inflatable characters throughout the show. Otherwise, all the under-stage lighting makes the plexiglass stage feel like its own lighting instrument.” She continues, “We’re getting some excellent colors out of our STRIKE Ms. There’s one particular crazy color effect we do with them for the song ‘Won’t Stand Down,’ that I’ve never been able to get out of any other light before. We mimic it in the rest of the rig. It almost feels like a digital color glitch.”
Routhier also notes, “This set list contains heavier music than the previous tour and that lends itself to lots of strobing. The challenge we always face when the music requires lots of strobing, is that it can become too much, leaving the audience blinded by lighting. So, we try our hardest to vary the types of cues in the strobes. We use all of the strobes in the brightest strobe possible, in white only a couple times in the show. This keeps those super bright moments more impactful.”
Gear
Lighting:
- 3 MA Lighting grandMA3 full-size Console
- 10 MA Lighting grandMA2 NPU
- 8 ACME Scorpius
- 16 Ayrton PERSEO
- 11 Ayrton Domino LT
- 152 Claypaky Xtylos Aqua
- 32 Martin MAC AURA XIP
- 24 GLP X4 Bar 20
- 36 GLP JDC Line 1000
- 120 CHAUVET Color STRIKE M
- 24 Martin VDO Atomic Bold
- 2 Martin P3-300 System Processor
- 1 FollowMe System w/ 4 Targets
- 4 72-Way AC Distro Racks
- 24 12×12 10’ Truss, Black
- 8 12×12 8’ Truss, Black
- 4 12×12 5’ Truss, Black
- 6 8’ Hud Truss, Black
- 4 10’ Hud Truss, Black
- 14 8’ 20”x30” Truss, Black
- 36 1-Ton Motor
- 24 2-Ton Motor
- 28 1-Ton Kinesys Motor
- 2 Kinesys K2 Console
- 2 Kinesys Array Distro
- 2 Kineysy Rigger Remote
- 2 Kinesys RS485 Converter
Video:
- Grass Valley Korona XP Frame Switcher
- Ross Ultrix Router and Terminal Gear
- 4 Grass Valley LDX150 Cameras 4K HDR 29.97
- 2 Fujinon 125x Long Lens with Wide Angle ENG lens
- 2 Fujinon 13×4.5 Superwide Lens
- 5 Panasonic Robotic 150 Cameras
- 4 Dreamchip 4K Mini Cameras
- 1 Waterbird Camera Track
- 1 PoleCam
- 1 Autopod System
- 2 Barco UDX 40K Projectors
- 2 32’ x 18’ Rear Projection Surfaces
SFX:
- 1 ER Productions Bespoke Muse Flaming Propane Logo
- 2 MA Lighting grandMA3 compact Console
- 14 MagicFX Pump Based Flameblazers
- 8 MagicFX Stand-Alone Flameblazers
- 9 MagicFX Stadium Shots for Streamers Fired Wirelessly with Galaxsis
- 12 MagicFX Stadium Blasters
- 10 MagicFX Swirl Fan XL
- 1 Co2 Jet in the Handset Piece Fired Wirelessly with Galaxsis
- 1 MDG Ice Fog Q Low Fog Generator
- 1 Look Solutions Viper 2.6 Fog Generator
- 1 ER Productions Smoke Sausage
- 4 Look Solutions Unique 2.1 Hazer
- 4 Look Solutions Viper Deluxe Fog Generator
