The Rolling Stones Tour of the Americas 1975- The Lotus Stage

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

When the Rolling Stones hit the United States after a 3 year absence in 1975 they brought in tow a very impressive stage, which at the time was the largest and most expensive production to tour arenas costing $1.6 million.(Reference)   It was also the first tour to feature PA and lighting systems that were entirely rigged from the ceiling with no support towers being used as opposed to the bukly PA systems that would sit on either side of the stage.(see photo)  This enabled every single seat to have a clear view of the stage.   Originally the plan was to play in the center of the arenas but according to Mick Jagger, there were to many sound problems and they didn't have enough time to fix them before the tour started. (Reference)   U2's Bono, who with U2 have staged some of rocks most important tours has sited the Lotus Flower stage from this tour as an inspiration. (Reference)

                                                                   Photo: Roland Feria

The Lotus Flower shaped stage was the centerpiece of the show which also featured an inflatable phallus, a confetti puffing dragon, and Jagger on a trapeze rope.  At some of the major dates the audiences were treated to calypso dancers, steel drummers, a Chinese dragon that would weave through the crowd, as well as billowing fabric drapes and blinking lights that arched up from the lighting truss and flew over the crowd.  The dull cold arenas they performed in were transformed into magical Asian themed temples of rock n roll that left audiences wowed and was truly the beginning of the Rolling Stones stage spectacle that has continued until this day.    The impressive stage which was conceptualized by drummer Charlie Watts (RS Issue 191) and designed by famed theatrical designer Robin Wagner , who was a pioneer for large scale automated scenery. 

                                                      Photo: Roland Feria
  The design featured huge triangle shaped petals that were closed at the beginning of the show and would slowly open during the opening number 'Honky Tonk Women'.  As they opened, Mick Jagger would be towards the top of the center petal peaking over into the audience as it lowered down revealing the band.

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

If you go to the 14:12 mark in the below video you can view very rare footage of Mick being lowered on the petal: 

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

The front petals would raise up slightly during the show during certain numbers and would close fully at the end of the show.   The stage although not in the middle of the arena allowed seating all around it but the band primarily played to the front of the stage. The stage floor was ornately decorated with an intricate floral/paisley like pattern.  The stage was also gently raked in elevation with the back being 8 feet high and the front 4 feet high.

It should be noted that the Stones 1976 Europe tour featured a re-floored stage that was much less intricate and had a maze-like pattern on it. It also did not have the neon lighting running inside the outer edges and instead had yellow and blue lightbulbs along the outer edges.  (see photos here 1, 2, 3).  

Photo: Neil Fitzpatrick

 Two stages were used, one that featured blue and red neon lights built into it that were covered by clear plexiglass as to shine through, and hydraulics that opened and closed the petals was used on the East and West coast as well as the Chicago show, while the one without hydraulics and neon lights was used on the other indoor arena dates.   Both stages had foot wide strips of mirror outlining each petal which were rumored to be used not only for looks but as a warning strip for the often stoned band so they wouldn't walk over the edge. 

   Here is the blueprint for the hydraulic equipped stage:

Photo: Roland Feria

  The outside of the petals that did open and close were covered in strips of aluminum that gave it a mirror look and  created a beautiful effect at the beginning of the show when the spotlights would reflect off of them and into the audience.   

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

As can be seen in the above photo, the band would be concealed by hanging fabric that would be lit in purple and would be pulled up into the lighting truss as the petals lowered with Mick at the very top of the center petal peaking out at the crowd.  

Below is a great shot taken before the show at Madison Square Garden.  You can see the steel drummers and their drums at the front of the stage.  

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

 The show was lit by Broadway veteran Jules Fisher who had designed stages for David Bowie and would go on to design stages for Kiss (see post here). Interviewed on the beggining of the tour Jules Fischer told Rolling Stone magazine "Wait till you see the Madison Square Garden show, It'll be decorated like a garden: hundreds of leaves on cables leading to the stage and the petals of the stage will be closed to resemble a tree trunk. The petals will open to show the band and Mick will rise on an elevator and we'll project flying eagles all over the audience.(see photo here) The leaves, ten-foot leaves will rise on hydraulic pistons and there'll be neon rimming on the stage.  It'll be beautiful."(RS Issue 191) According to Dave Marsh in Rolling Stone, the 350 ten-foot leaves made of white gauze with silver foil trim removed from the ceiling of Madison Square Garden before the show because they were considered ineffective and too much of a temptation to the hands of the audience. (Reference)

As seen in the lighting plot above, the lighting rig was circular in shape which was very cutting edge at the time and featured a mix of Par 64 and Par 36 cans as can be seen in the photo below. It also featured super trooper spotlights on either side of the stage at 45 degree angles towards the back of the arenas. *These same lights had been used on the 1972 stage where they were used very effectively in a effect designed by Chip Monk.  They were on stage behind the band pointed up  towards the ceiling and would bounce off a huge mirror that was over the stage. (See photos here 1 2 and video) 

The above shot is actually from the Europe 76 tour but used the same lighting rig.  

Below is a photo taken at the Madison Square Garden show just before showtime. You will notice the blue "christmas" lights strung out over the crowd from the lighting rig, and the cluster of lights prominent in the photo that were projecting the eagles that Fischer had mentioned. You can also see in the front rows around the stage, the steel drummers and calypso band hired for the show.  They would play before the intro of "Fanfare for the Common Man" signaled the start of the show.

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

Here is the stage being set up for the first time at the tours first stop in Baton Rouge. 

Photo: Annie Leibovitz

Below the same non-hydraulic equipped stage is constructed in Minneapolis.

 During Star Star and inflatable phallus would come through the center of the stage and wave madly in the air as Jagger would ride it and on some occasions attack it until it deflated back into the stage.    It was nicknamed "tired grandfather" by the band because of its inability to stay upright.    The prop was controversial and in San Antonio, a judge told the Stones management that if they used the prop, the concert would be shut down.   They decided not to use it on that stop but it was used at all the other indoor arena shows.  

Photo: Bob Gruen

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes


The footage below taken from the Los Angeles Forum show on July 7th is interesting as the penis has been transformed into a middle finger complete with nail and and knuckle markings.   

Billy Preston who was the touring keyboardist with the band at the time was given two songs during the set "That's Life" and  "Outta Space", during the latter, a trapeze rope would descend from the lighting rig and Jagger would swing out over the first 5 or so rows of the audience, making sure everyone knew that he was still the ringleader of this circus. 

      Above and bottom right Photo: Roland Feria

 

At the climax of the shows during Jumping Jack Flash, Jagger would bring out a dragon head that had an inflatable tongues that would lap at the audience in the front row and would spew confetti into the air. 

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

The shows in MSG and LA ended with Sympathy for the Devil with the steel drummers and dancers circling the stages as the petals closed around the band ending what was for many Stones fans, the ultimate concert and tour.  

Photo: Christopher Simon Sykes

At the 7:12  mark in the below video, you can see Mick Jagger re-enter the stage via the elevator located in front of Charlie Watts drum platform, the same hole in which the phallus and the dragon come out of.  



You can click here for a 30 minute audio interview with Mick Jagger from June 11, 1975 where Mick discusses the stage design.  
For anyone intersted in doing further research, I would recommend tracking down the 1978 book The Rolling Stones On Tour by Sykes, Liebovitz, and Southern, a lot of the images used in this post were taken from that book.  For those with some extra cash on hand, Genesis publications produced a deluxe leather bound book The Rolling Stones Tour of the America's 75, by Sykes, Rudge, and Jagger for  a cool $700.   
Special thanks to the people on IORR.org that helped with me with this piece, especially Roland Feria, and Richard Galbraith.  

Update

I am working on a new post about the Rolling Stones Tour of the America's 1975.  There is a lot of research to be done, but keep an eye out for this next post soon. 

Def Leppard- 1987-1988 Hysteria In the Round

This post is more of a video highlight and less of an in-depth examination.  This will be a regular feature of my blog to highlight tours or stages that deserve a look back upon.
Def Leppard's Hysteria tour was when they were at the height of popularity and they had the budget to put on a show that would impress.   The band decided to put on the concert in the middle of the arena, allowing for all the tickets to be sold in the arena known as in-the-round seating rather then the standard end stage.  With Def Leppard at their prime, this allowed the band to sell 3-5,000 tickets more per show.


 In-the-round dated back to 1914 when it was first used at Columbia University for plays, but it wasn't until 1978 that a rock band took a stage on tour in the round.   Yes developed a rotating stage for its 1978-1979 Tormato tour.  The stage was essentially a large record player.  
Below is rare 8mm footage of the tour, notice the speed at which the stage turns, begging the question if any of the members got sick.

Def Leppard's stage was truly state of the art featuring the album artwork on the floor with different levels and a rotating drum set.  The guitar and instrument techs had their workstations underneath the stage and the stage monitors and guitar amps were not onstage so it had a very uncluttered feel to it. The band would get to the stage by being placed in empty equipment cases and wheeled through the unsuspecting audience to underneath the stage.

In an interview with Jeb Wright for his Rockbrigage podcast which you can listen to here, Def Leppard singer Joe Elliot gave some info on the inspiration: "Peter Mensch our manager at the time. He went to Madison Square Garden and saw Frank Sinatra and Frank was In The Round and he came back. And you know Mensch wasn't much older than us. He's like two years older than me or something. So it's the same kind of generation you know. So he came back all excited, 'I just Frank at the Garden man and he played In The Round. I think you guys should do that.' So we literally did you know. He got it together. We found out all about it."  "Again Phay McMahon whose our production manager now, was our lighting designer at the time. And he was involved in part of that as well. So it all you know, he put it into motion and it just kinda happened. And it was really exciting, I gotta say. It was probably the most fun I've ever had on stage you know because you had to run around. It's something we're actually talking about doing it again at some point."  "Actually you get more people in. No, no you can get a few more people in. No without a doubt, it's great and it's four front rows. So instead of just having, it brings everything closer you know. What would have been a nosebleed is fifty percent closer. So that was the great thing and there's a lot of pluses. I mean very - a lot of hard work. I mean I remember coming off stage feeling like I was 80 years old. You know sometimes we'd do like two and half hour shows. But yeah that was so much fun."

Here singer Joe Elliot gives a brief tour of the stage.

In this clip filmed during a soundcheck you can get a good luck at all the steel grating that the stage was comprised of.   

The stage was hidden from view by a black scrim with the album artwork that was draped all around the stage.

 As seen in this video, the scrim would drop at the beginning of the show giving the audience their first glimpse of the impressive stage.

Here is the song Photograph taken from the officially released concert film:

In this MTV segment, there is some great footage and some fans reactions to the stage:

When the arena's the band would play in were too small to fit the entire in-the-round stage setup they simply setup just half of the stage.   In this clip filmed at the Hollywood Sportatorium, you can see that setup.  This was one of the last ever concerts held at the venue which was notorious for its bad acoustics and fabled rock concerts:

When the band toured American Amphitheaters in the summer of 1988, they used a completely different setup that used pieces of the in-the-round setup but added some stairs on stage left and right and  grated steps up to the drum riser.  You can get a good look at it during a sound check in this video:

 and in concert here:

Pink Floyd In the Flesh Tour 1977

Pink Floyd is not only one of the most popular bands of all times, but they have consistently raised the bar for rock concerts production since they formed in the late 60's. First known for their psychedelic light shows in England, the band always set about to incorporate new elements to their live show that complimented their sound. With the mainstream success of 1973's Dark Side of the Moon, and the financial rewards that went along with it, the band was one of the first to tour with a giant circular screen and a projector that played custom made films that were perfectly syncopated with their songs. The circular screen would remain a Pink Floyd trademark appearing at every Pink Floyd show throug the last tour in 1994. Keyboardist Rick Wright elaborated on this in an interview "People always expect the Flyod to come up with something different, new and better, when its comes to visuals, and its very difficult to keep thinking of new ideas. The projector for the film was incredibly expensive. Videos and projections are now commonplace at rock concerts and its easy to forget that the Floyd were pioneers in this regard. (See Photos Below)

They were also one of the first bands to use pyrotechnics, something that most large rock bands now incorporate into their shows.  See below from their 1973 tour:

 In 1977, Pink Floyd released Animals and set out to play some of their first American outdoor stadium shows in Spring and Summer of of that year. The tour was groundbreaking in several areas but was an important building block to putting together Mark Fisher and Jonathan Park for the first time and also building the team that 3 years later would create perhaps the most famous and audacious rock production of all time, The Wall (which will be explored in detail later in another post). At that time, most bands played under generic roofs made from scaffolding and tarp (see below) that were not appealing visually, so the band set out to create something different to perform under. At that time, most bands played under generic roofs made from scaffolding and tarp and was not appealing visually so the band set out to create something different. 

Ted Happold and Frei Otto were called upon to design umbrellas that would rise from below the stage and unfurl. They were ranged in diameter from 4.5m to 7m and made from White Cotton. Below are photos taken of all the umbrellas being tested in Cleveland, Ohio were the band set an all time attendance record.

 

 This enabled the band to use infatables above the stage which they would have not been able to do if using a scarffold stage roof.  If there was a chance of rain, the umbrellas would be deployed.  Mark Fiasher took these photos when the the umbrellas were being tested in London. All Photos Below: Copyright Mark Fisher

The inflatables were used in dramatic fashion during the show. The album Animals was influenced by George Orwell's book 1984 with the hierarchy of animals being represented by Sheep (people), Dogs (police), and Pigs (masters, politicians). During the song Dogs, the family would rise up inflated and then deflate, they then would inflate again with internal lights on, and at the line "dragged down by the stone" the family would deflate and slowly deflate down into a crumpled heap behind the stage.

This tour also marked the first time Mark Fisher and Jonathan Park collaborated on a stage design a relationship that would be one of the most creative partnerships in the touring business for years. They were responsible for creating the inflatables used on the tour. To tie in with the Animals album cover which features a floating pig ballon in front of the Battersea Power Station in London, Pink Floyd through Andrew Sanders commissioned the pair to create a nuclear family of a Mother, Father, and 2.5 offspring, a reference to a statistic that the average American nuclear family had 2.5 kids. A cadillac, a television, and a refrigerator full of phallic sausages was also made.
"Sanders and Fisher sculpted the scale models for the inflatables in styrofoam and using an overhead projector, enlarged tissue paper patterns from them up to full-size cutting patterns...Park engineered the rigging and designed and built the raising and lowering systems for the inflatables." (Sutherland Lyall, Rock Sets).

Jonathan Park recounts: "And so the sequence that these things would rise up would be the... if I remember the sequence correctly, the children would rise up first. There was a boy, and then a girl with half a boy. These were just two separate objects. They would go up, and they would be followed by the television, the refrigerator, the Cadillac and then would come the wife on the sofa, and also simultaneously rising would be the father... the man, both climbing the highest. And then they would all be rising up together and this was quite difficult to achieve, because what I discovered... you know we were working right on the limits of what the electric motors could do... the electric winches could do... with these special grooved drums that I had drawn up... and we actually made them all...the family would deflate and just hang there and then expand again, with their internal lights. And in the last verse the where the man is dragged down by the stone and found dead on the end of the phone, the family would descend and he would fly across to the far side of the stage and descend over the head and behind Dave Gilmour. And in the last dying moments of the song he would crumple in a heap behind the stage." (Rogerwaters.org)Below notice the .5 child.

 Below, stage techs are preparing the cadillac's "launch" before the show in Cleveland.

During the song Pigs, a giant inflatable Pink pig like the one on the album cover of Animals would rise up from the middle of the stadium where the mixing and light boards were located. It would fly over the audience on a cable sometimes as long as 1300 feet depending on the size of the stadium, stopping here and there to snort at the audience.

It would then disappear at the back of the stage. At outdoor shows, stage techs would fill a cheaper version of the inflatable with propane and helium and an igniter and let it rise above the stage into the sky where it would be ignited and would ignite and fall backstage. This stunt was successful until a show in Milwaukee where Mark Fischer and Richard Hartman experimented with acetlylene and oxygen and the cable got disconnected and the pig flew away over the parking lot where it exploded and fell damaging several cars. Park remembers the scene, "And I was holding one of the wires up to the head... with a snap hook on it and I just watched my wire come down with the snap on it. And the rest of it had disintegrated. And it went off with the most enormous bang... it was out in the car park, and it affected... it damaged a number of cars. It was extremely loud, and flaming bits of the inflatable even flew on to stage inside the stadium and the band jumped out of their skins. And there were definite orders to not repeat this after the concert. after being told off by the head master. It might look good... Roger was always very... it was very instructive working with him in this respect... because he might well decide that however interesting an affect was, it may become excessive and inappropriate he was a good judge."(Rogerwaters.org)
Below the only known photo of the "exploding" pig:

The enormous crowds on this tour began to bother Roger as he felt the crowd were there to party rather then contemplate the music and the lyrics. At the show in Cleveland, someone climbed onto the giant cable that stretched across the stadium and carried the pig. On the bootleg, an announcer can be heard pleading with the person telling them If anybody has hold of the other line on the pig up there, please let go, its very dangerous. We’re trying to bring it back in from over the audience. Please! Please let go of the line if you have your hand on the line.” Ten days later in Montreal, the famous "spitting" incident would happen, where Roger, supposedly spit on a fan who wouldn't be quite, and from his experience on this tour came up with the concept for The Wall, feeling that there was a metaphorical wall between the band and the audience. This idea came to fruition on The Wall tour 3 years later when a 40 foot wall was gradually erected between the band and the audience. The flying pig would become a concert staple for Pink Floyd and Roger Waters on all their subsequent tours. Below a photo from the Montreal concert:

At the outdoor Stadium shows During the song Sheep, small Sheep made out of a similar material as the inflatables where shot out of cannons from the side of the stage and floated down upon the crowd on the floor of the stadium.  Below: Sheep being tested.

©Copyright Mark Fisher

Above: sheep being unpacked before a show at Angels Stadium, Anaheim, CA.
Due to the lack of a permanent overhead stage truss, lighting was provided on pneumatic telescopic towers on either side of the stage, cherry pickers (which were also equipped with Pyro effects), and lights that were attached around the circular video screen." The cherry pickers were quire impressive as they could lower and rise above the band. Roadie Chris Cockram remembers the cherry pickers, "They were mounted on a 10 metre tractor unit that was driven in to position each side of stage. Each cherry picker traveled in its own 45ft truck. In the air they could be extended out over the entire stage, and the hydraulics, supporting the arm and cage were, smooth and responsive, they literally flew.The pilot sat in a racing car seat, and operated a single joy stick at his right hand, on the left all the switches for lights and flares, the Follow Spot was mounted to a swivel plate and sat just above his right shoulder, like some bloody great rocket launcher, theses things would glide in to position in silence, completely blacked out, the guy's wore all black, with balaclavas and gloves and then they would burst into view in a blaze of light and fly across the stage, I thought they were brilliant. There was a point in the show, with David Gilmour starting off on Steel slide guitar, the Cherry Pickers were positioned high over head, one over the Keyboard's, one over David, this thing would drop in to position to about 3 meters above his head, completely blacked out. The pilot was flying blind in a straight drop, I would count him down on the headset, that was fun, it became a competition to see how close we could get, and how quickly he could drop, but it had to be a smooth stop, H underneath was possibly one of the worlds leading musicians! Today you wouldn't get away with it."(Pinkfloydz.com) 

Close up of the Cherry Picker and the mounted lights:

Above Photos: Copyright Erich Biruk
As a climax to the show a huge rotating mirror fan that was built for the bands 1975 tour would rise up from behind drummer Nick Mason and spin as spotlights hit it creating prisms of lights that would reflect all over the audience and venue.

Chris Cockram remembers "We rehearsed assembling the bottom wings on to the massive mirror ball, as it appeared from under the stage, it was too big to fit under in one piece, so we assembled it as it rose. One night one of the wings wouldn't go on, (it had been bent during the last pack-down), there followed a frantic scramble for cable ties and Gaffa tape.
It was a race against time as we fumbled our way through trying to get it on, these things weighed a lot, steel frame, 2 meters long, and thick board with a thousand or so mirrors, just holding it up was hard, as it started to rise, we stuck 3 or 4 cable ties in each bolt hole, and slapped Gaff' across the frame, we kept at it until it was out of reach, When it started to spin, we all said a silent pray, and just hoped it would hold, underneath that was Nick Mason, thankfully it did, Forget putting tiles on the space shuttle, they should've used Gaff'!" (Pinkfloydz.com)

Photos Below: Copyright Erich Biruk

A video that shows good shots of the cherry pickers in action as well as the spinning mirror fan can be viewed by clicking here.

At the Cleveland show, the band treated the record breaking 83,000 crowd to a treat with their plane emblazoned with Pink pigs on the underside of the wings. Jonathan Park recounts the story:"...at that time, the band and often the crew flew around in a 737 jet aircraft which was hired to transport us because we were doing these shows every other day all over the States. And in Cleveland, at the beginning of the show, there were sounds in the quad sound system like in Grand Chester Meadows. And then five minutes before the show, you'd hear church bells. And then about 30 seconds before the show the sound of a jet would fly over in the Quad... and very effective too. But at this show, it was decided that the group's aircraft was to actually be the jet! And it came... and it flew 500 feet over the docks... you know the badlands was near the docks in Cleveland... right over the stadium at about 500 feet! I mean it was fantastic!! And we got fined but $1500.00 for violating Federal air regulations. Of course these days you would not be even allowed to do anything like that, especially after 9/11." (Rogerwaters.org)

Roger was also very particular about the inflatables and other effects happening at precisely the right time. On a bootleg of the Cleveland show he is heard saying ''NOW WERE GOING TO DO ANOTHER SONG DEDICATED TO THE CREW CALLED ''WOULDNT KNOW A CUE IF IT FELL ON YOUR FUCKING HEAD'' obviously upset that they had missed a cue in the previous song.
Jonathan Park elaborates on this there was a lot of rushing around and frantic signaling to make sure that the cues took place on time, because you couldn't hear the music. What people don't realize is that when you're back stage, you can't hear the music with the same clarity as you can out front. And if you have to do a cue on a particular beat or word or particular guitar solo, then you need to be cued by the people out on the desk (the sound board usually located in the center of the audience) who can see and hear these things. So we eventually solved this by the time we did The Wall and would have a play back system in our control desk so we could hear everything, and also a television monitor so we could also have a complete picture of what was going on. So that we could keep... so we could cue things accurately. With Pink Floyd, and with Roger in particular, EXACT cueing was absolutely required. There was nothing that would make Roger more upset than if the cues didn't take place in the right place... if they just became just an effect that didn't relate to precisely to the song. There was a moment in dogs... I can't remember the line at the moment... but if I listen to Dogs... I know... suddenly my body goes into GO mode... you know, and it's counting out 20 seconds to go... 10 seconds to go... and Go... and my fingers operate, you know my eight fingers, would go into this array which would press all the buttons one by one. (Rogerwaters.org)

Like many tours during this period, the footage is limited and until any professional footage is released, all that exists are grainy super 8mm footage shot by fans. In the video below shot at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, CA in 1977, the umbrellas can be seen deployed over the stage and the cherry pickers can be seen hovering over the band and at one point deploying sparking pyrotechnics. At 2:40 there is footage of the "exploding pig".

  

I hope you enjoyed reading this, please feel free to comment or write andy thoughts or with any info that I can add to this article. I will be posting some shorter pieces in the next few months highlighting stages that have gone under the radar and have been forgotten by history.