Designer Insights

Longtime LD Angus MacPhail on the Band’s Latest Trek

The Cure performed another of their marathon more-than-three-hour concert performances to a packed amphitheater of devoted fans, performing both hits and rarities in their ever-evolving set list. There’s no denying the bands influence and originality in a career spanning 40 years. Bringing even more mood and impact to vocalist Robert Smith and the band is lighting designer and director Angus MacPhail, who talked to us about his long association with the band.

Tori Kelly’s “Unbreakable” tour, in support of her June 2015 album release, Unbreakable Smile, trekked across the U.S. and Canada from April 5 to May 21. Designer Chris Kuroda was initially contacted by talent manager Scooter Braun and Allison Kaye, general manager of Scooter Braun Projects, to design the looks for the tour. Kuroda has a longstanding working relationship with Braun and Kaye, having worked for them on world tours for Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande. Allison is also a fan of Phish, a band that Kuroda has lit, as LD and lighting director, since 1989, and that design work played an influential role as well.

Production designers James Scott and Louis Oliver formed Okulus Ltd. in 2014 and have since gone on to work with many clients at different stages in their careers, supporting shows in venues ranging from clubs to stadiums. PLSN spoke with Scott and Oliver about the current Chvrches tour they designed.

LIGHTING

Throughout the creative process for this tour, lighting designer and director Cate Carter wanted to explore the different facets of Ellie’s musical personality. Carter and co-designer Dan Shipton (of Black Skull Creative) were inspired by the wide range of musical styles and influences that Ellie explores both through her recorded work and live performance.

For the Muse Drones world tour, which started in 2015 and continues into 2016, lighting designer and director Oli Metcalfe was asked to deliver a production design that placed the band in the middle of an arena floor for an in-the-round delivery. Included in the master plan was the existence of flying drones in the show.

Production designer Alex Skowron recently wrapped up the latest leg on his tour with the classic rock star John Fogerty. The singer amassed a wealth of hits while leading Creedence Clearwater Revival in the late 1960s and 70’s before embarking on a solo career that has spanned the last 30 years.

The Zac Brown Band winds down their seven-month tour Dec. 12 with their last show of the year in Columbus, OH. It’s been a fun ride for all involved on the visual side. The Georgia-based country act played various sized venues from stadiums to amphitheaters. The three-tiered set featured a video wall behind the band measuring 6 by 52 feet (HxW). Perched atop that were the drums, percussion and ample space for various band members to walk up stairs and ramps and play. It’s clear from the start that the 12 band members like to move around. Accurate Staging provided the set.

Twenty One Pilots’ Tyler Joseph founded the band in 2009 near Columbus, Ohio with two college friends. The band’s name is linked to a 1947 Arthur Miller play, All My Sons. That play is based on a real-life scandal. In the 1940s, aviation company Curtiss-Wright, which traces its lineage to the Wright Brothers, was caught selling defective parts to the U.S. military. In the play, a character who at first thinks of his actions as being for the good of the company and his family takes his life after recognizing that his misdeeds caused the deaths of 21 pilots.

“Odd Couple” LDs Jason Bullock and Robb Jibson on the Fall Out Boy/Wiz Khalifa Tour

Chicago-based Robb Jibson is the LD of punk pop group Fall Out Boy. He caters to cue lists and joneses for his Jands Vista lighting console. New York City-based Jason Bullock is the LD for rapper Wiz Khalifa. He prefers to slam though faders and chooses the Chamsys. When both artists toured together for the “Boys of Zummer” tour, it begged the question: Can two LDs, on competing brands of consoles, come together to create one cohesive production for two radically different musical artists, without driving each other crazy?

Ligting designer and director Dan Hadley first started working with the Foo Fighters when he started filling in for shows here and there in 2001, then eventually took over full duties. Hadley has also worked with the Foo’s Dave Grohl with the band Them Crooked Vultures where Dave plays drums, as well as for Tenacious D where Dave would also fill that seat once in a blue moon.

Designer Paul “Arlo” Guthrie who set up Toss Film & Design back in 2002, a company that handles tour design, video and content, has kept busy lately. Along with the 2015 Van Halen tour design and recent Fleetwood Mac tour, Guthrie’s design on Lady Antebellum’s “Wheels Up” tour is his second outing with the band. His first collaboration with Lady A was their 2013 ‘Take Me Downtown” tour.

At the age of 11 Brock Hogan attended his first concert, Def Leppard’s Hysteria tour. Ever since that moment, he knew he wanted to be involved in lighting. He began in the industry as a stagehand for a local production company in Boise ID. After several years of working every gig he possibly could and always asking questions, Hogan worked his way up from a pusher to lead rigger. In 2001 he began working at a local venue called The Big Easy Concert House (now The Knitting Factory). Within a year, he convinced them to let him learn lighting.