Kylie Minogue’s Kiss Me Once tour, in support of her 2014 album release, moves to the artist’s native Australia with plans for five concerts in March 2015 before returning for another tour leg in Europe this summer. The 2015 shows follow the artist’s 2014 tour, with close to 30 shows in the U.K. and Europe. LD Rob Sinclair and lighting director Louisa Smurthwaite provided insight into the creative processes behind the tour’s extensive lighting design, which included fixtures from Harman’s Martin Professional.
Very early in the process, even before the new music was available, Sinclair had a meeting with creative director William Baker and set designer Alan Macdonald. They collaborated on a design theme making use of “precise geometry” and “Bauhaus aesthetics” with both set elements and costumes.
Baker then created a very detailed and instructive style guideline for each section of the show. For Sinclair, this was extremely useful. About a month before rehearsals, the music arrived, and Sinclair worked out a series of detailed notes and instructions to send to Smurthwaite, who patched it up and set up the consoles.
By now it was time for band rehearsals, and Sinclair and Smurthwaite spent two weeks in a small, badly ventilated room to pre-visualize the preliminary design and to make adjustments where necessary. Next came 10 days of strenuous production rehearsals. And despite all their previz efforts, Sinclair and Smurthwaite found that the design had to be changed an additional two or three times to ensure all the details were correct as well as incorporate feedback from Baker and Kylie.
“Nothing from pre-visualization ever works,” noted Sinclair. “It’s useful to have a start, but the transfer from screen to reality is always jarring. Baker and Kylie had some great notes about color and pace, and we produced pages of our own. We both have a great eye for detail and had long discussions about the timings of single cues.”
Sinclair and Smurthwaite’s final design included a dozen Martin MAC Auras and 120 Martin MAC Viper AirFXs, which made up the majority of the rig. According to Sinclair, the lighting design was precise and meticulously detailed. “We chose them [the Auras and AirFXs] particularly for their brightness,” said Sinclair. “We needed a hard-edged fixture that would be visible against a video wall and needed to be seen in the air more than on stage. I did a shoot-out in Vegas, and the AirFX was the clear winner.”
Working with this large amount of fixtures was a great challenge for this creative duo as it pushed them to develop designs that were more than just “Here come the spots or the washes.”
“Having the purity of one type of light source really captured our imaginations,” said Smurthwaite “It allowed us to create a clever and classy lighting design — it wasn’t obvious, and I really like that.”
Talking about the lighting design for a particular song, “Kiss Me Once,” Smurthwaite said they were trying to create an intimate experience for the audience by going from warm, soft looks to bold lasers to a petal drop.
“The lights, the effects and the laser paired flawlessly with both the music and Kylie’s stage presence, and the audience got sucked in,” said Smurthwaite. “Musically, I really enjoy the composition. The costumes took a life of their own, the dancers looked incredible and it’s where Kylie appeared so close to the audience on the B stage after an onslaught of laser mapping, video content, lighting and dancers. It’s a special moment.”
Ultimately, both Sinclair and Smurthwaite look back on the first part of the tour as a great success. “It was long and, at times, painful,” said Sinclair. “The drawing of plots and arguing about budgets took most of the summer. I’m not sure that either of us were making sense after so long without sleep, but I’m very, very proud of what we achieved.”
The lighting grid echoed the stage setup in part. Straight trusses with MAC Vipers spaced evenly apart were assembled into a giant matrix of sorts. It extended from the back of the stage to far over the audience. In between this ceiling of Vipers, the design had single strips of Video Blade LED running in a labyrinth pattern. Each blade was controlled via three channels of DMX through a node, so the designers could choose which strip of pixels they wanted illuminated and with which color.
Although the lighting was predominantly Vipers, the team still found a use to add a few other fixtures to run off of their chosen console, the Jands Vista L5. A smattering of Vari*Lite VL3500 Wash units and an allotment of Clay Paky Sharpys were thrown into the mix. For strobes, Sinclair went with Solaris Flares. Lighting crew chief Glenn Power led a six-person team of techs.
Total Fabrications built the set. A giant choral style set of risers enveloped the upstage area with a video screen behind it. What appears to be an array of steel beams reminiscent of a skyscraper in construction, stands between the LED lined risers and the back video wall, breaking up the media content nicely.
There is also a line of 14 clear light boxes in a wall upstage. These boxes are lined with neon and backlit by MAC Auras. Sinclair was able to use lasers as more of a lighting fixture as he mapped this whole structure with them, adding another cool element to the stage.
Downstage of the main apron, Minogue worked a long thrust that transformed into a T-shape in the middle of the audience. Sinclair’s light grid reached far enough out into the house that he was literally utilizing the audience as part of the set.
While Minogue prepared for the Australian tour, Sinclair was on tour with Queen + Adam Lambert, where he also decided to build an entire rig around the MAC Vipers. Sinclair is attending the rehearsals for Kylie’s Australian tour, and Smurthwaite will be running the shows.
Sinclair, who is trained as an electrician, got his start in the industry sweeping floors at Vari-Lite and worked his way up to fixing lights in the shop, then fixing them on the road, operating other people’s lighting designs, before designing his own. A new member of Kylie’s team, he has also designed the lighting for Queen, Peter Gabriel, Adele, Pet Shop Boys, Miley Cyrus, Vampire Weekend and other prominent acts. He feels privileged and proud to be making a living doing something he loves so much.
Smurthwaite started in the theatre and corporate events industry but left to try working with other technologies for a design multi-media company. She did projection mapping and guerilla marketing with digital equipment and interactive environments. In the process, she got mesmerized by lasers and started programming and designing shows for music tours. While supporting the looks for British alt rock band Pulp in 2011, she met Sinclair. They have since also collaborated on looks for Bloc Party, Birdy and Goldfrapp.
