Secret World Tour
The Secret World Tour was a concert tour mounted by the English singer-songwriter Peter Gabriel to promote his 1992 album Us. The stage show was designed by French-Canadian Robert Lepage, expressing the themes of tension and union between male and female forces, as represented by two stages linked by moving walkway. Three tour legs with elaborate staging were interspersed with two legs of much simpler WOMAD festival dates. Many of the same songs were performed by Gabriel, and he felt that all of his large-scale performances during these two years were part of the same tour. Secret World was Gabriel's first major solo outing since his tour of 1986–87 to support the album So. Afterward, he waited for almost a decade before embarking on the next tour, Growing Up, in 2002.
Musically, Gabriel used his most recent songs as well as a few earlier compositions for the set list of Secret World, taking songs primarily from Us, but also from So and other works. A handful of songs called for female vocals, especially "Blood of Eden" with its theme of sexual union. For these roles, Gabriel began the tour with British musician Joy Askew as second keyboardist and vocal duet partner, then he brought Irish singer-songwriter Sinéad O'Connor onto the tour as guest vocalist, covering Askew's keyboard parts with Jean-Claude Naimro of Kassav'. O'Connor left suddenly in October, and American singer-songwriter Paula Cole was quickly recruited to fill her position, earning high praise for her performance. The core of Gabriel's touring band was composed of long-time collaborators: bassist Tony Levin, guitarist David Rhodes, drummer Manu Katché and violinist L. Shankar. This was the first time that Gabriel used in-ear monitors on tour.
A few days after Cole joined the tour, the show was filmed and recorded in Modena, Italy, to produce the concert video Secret World Live. The video was honoured at the 38th Annual Grammy Awards, winning in the category Best Music Video, Long Form. An associated live album was released with the same name—Secret World Live—it rose to number 10 on the United Kingdom charts, was certified 2× Platinum in Italy, and was certified Gold in the United States.
Staging
Gabriel's sixth studio album Us was released at the end of September 1992, and was very quickly certified Gold in the UK. Responding to this success, Gabriel planned a concert tour. In November, he spoke to Quebec-based stage director Robert Lepage about putting together a show based on extensive use of video projection screens, and multiple stages linked by railway track. However, U2 was already incorporating massive video elements on their Zoo TV Tour, and Gabriel did not want to copy their style. The railway idea proved impractical, so Gabriel and Lepage met with German design firm Atelier Markgraph for a brainstorming session, to formulate a tour concept. Early the next year, British director Dave "T" Taraskevics joined Gabriel and Lepage in meetings with scenic designers and the team from Atelier Markgraph. A dual-stage design emerged, with a square stage representing masculine energy paired with a circular stage representing feminine energy. A bridge or catwalk would run between the two stages, complete with a conveyor belt to form a moving walkway. The square stage would be in the usual position at one end of the concert venue, while the circular stage would extend into the main seating area. The runway between them was to be about long. A living tree at the centre of the circular stage represented womanhood, while a red British telephone kiosk at the square stage represented manhood. The UK firm Brilliant Stages was hired to construct the stage equipment. Only one complete stage set-up was created; the production crew would not be able to "leap-frog" ahead with a second system to ease the gruelling back-to-back installation/tear-down schedule.A video projection screen was rigged over the square stage; it could be lowered to the stage, or revolved in place by motors. A translucent white dome and associated lighting rig was flown over the circular stage with the ability to lower the dome on command, completely covering the stage. Trapdoors in the two stages, equipped with lifts, allowed performers to rise up from below, or descend out of view. The moving walkway brought performers and props smoothly from one stage to the other. Two complete sets of band gear were used, allowing musicians to shift quickly between the two stages. Extensive radio-frequency wireless technology provided freedom of movement for Gabriel and most of his band, except for drum sets, guitar amps and keyboard rigs which were connected by cabling. Stage crew were very busy throughout the show, moving props and set pieces underneath the two stages, operating the trapdoors and lifts, and striking or re-setting band gear. Two control booths flanked the stage, one for the lighting desk and show director Dave T, the other for multiple sound mixing consoles.
Brilliant Stages, a division of the Samuelson Group, built the pair of stages linked by moving walkway. Gabriel appreciated the results. He said that "having two places to go, the feeling of playing two stages, was quite different from the usual show where everybody's pointing the same way and the energy is going in the same direction." Lepage insisted the band learn to dance together, even skipping together.
Britannia Row Productions provided the sound system, composed of 70 Turbosound Flashlight mid-high loudspeakers, 78 Flashlight low frequency enclosures, 34 near-field speakers made by Funktion One, and Turbosound TMS3 delay speakers as required. Gabriel's front of house mixer Peter Walsh said that the main speaker system was essentially running six loudspeaker zones in monaural sound rather than stereo, with occasional musical elements given a directional emphasis. The square stage held the main arrays of speakers, with mid-high boxes flown overhead, and low frequency boxes stacked on the floor, while a smaller but similar layout surrounded most of the circular stage. Walsh mixed the majority of microphones on a Yamaha PM4000, assisted by audio crew leader Huw Richards mixing drum microphones on a Yamaha PM3000. A third mixer made by Sonosax was used to blend in pre-recorded tracks. The outboard gear included Lexicon PCM70 reverbs, TC Electronic graphic equalizers, and BSS Varicurves—all of these digital devices were controlled by an Apple PowerBook sending MIDI scene changes.
The band's stage monitor system relied largely on radio-frequency wireless in-ear monitors, along with a few traditional foldback loudspeakers for effects, and to serve as a back-up in case the IEMs stopped working. Gabriel was hesitant to change his monitor style and accept IEMs, but upon testing them he was thoroughly convinced. Independent engineer Bryan Olson of New York–based Firehouse Productions provided some of the equipment and mixed the band's monitors.
The complex production suffered from too few technical rehearsals before opening to the public; Sound on Sound magazine wrote that "the first couple of weeks of 'The Secret World Tour' formed a not-so-secret rehearsal session." Robert Lepage and Peter Gabriel would collaborate again on two of his tours, the Growing Up Tour and the i/o Tour.
Synopsis
The concert opened with darkness and the sound of the pre-recorded instrumental "Zaar" from Gabriel's 1989 album Passion. For some concerts, this was followed by solo duduk played by guest musician Levon Minassian interpreting the composition "The Feeling Begins", also from Passion. Most concerts omitted the duduk solo, and "Zaar" was instead followed by a red British telephone box rising up from the square stage with Peter Gabriel illuminated inside, singing "Come Talk to Me" into a telephone handset. Gabriel was joined either by Sinéad O'Connor or Paula Cole rising up from the circular stage into the light to sing backing vocals. Gabriel emerged from the telephone box, straining toward his female counterpart with the handset cord taut with tension, pulling further and further from the box as Gabriel moves by way of the conveyor belt toward the circular stage."Quiet Steam" served as a prelude to the masculine and energetic "Steam", performed by the ensemble. Industrial mechanisms were shown on screen, and jets of visible white vapour shot up from the stage. Next was "Games Without Frontiers", a song from Gabriel's 1980 self-titled album.
The WOMAD song "Across the River" followed, with Gabriel in some concerts urging the audience to sing notes which were then sampled to create a synthesized choir for the song. Gabriel held a rain stick and pantomimed the role of oarsman while the band members "floated" from the square to the circular stage.
The instrumental "Slow Marimbas" was Gabriel's composition from the 1984 film Birdy. An extended performance of the feminine-themed "Shaking the Tree" was used by Gabriel as an opportunity to introduce the three longest-serving band members individually on the circular stage. A red lighting wash covered the male–female duet "Blood of Eden", leading into "San Jacinto" from Gabriel's self-titled 1982 album. Gabriel piloted a shipwreck raft from the circular stage to the square stage where he pantomimed behind the screen, lit from behind to show a giant silhouette.
Gabriel's song "Lovetown", from the 1993 film Philadelphia, preceded the feminine-themed "Digging in the Dirt", for which Gabriel wore a miniature video camera to provide distorted views of his face to the video projection screen, intercut later with distortions of the other musicians' faces. Gabriel revealed a large white sculptured face looking up from the circular stage. The introspective song "Washing of the Water" was followed by Gabriel's first solo hit, "Solsbury Hill", featuring the musicians skipping around the stage as children, accompanied by projected visuals of Gabriel's youth. Gabriel sang and played harmonica for "Kiss That Frog", and the video screen showed him and other musicians looking down through a clear basin of water, captured by a video camera under the stage aimed upward through the water.
The hit song "Sledgehammer" was followed by "Secret World", the tour's theme song and the show finale. Images of revolving furniture transitioned to revolving heads of the band members. A stream of luggage moved down the conveyor belt to the square stage, reminiscent of an airport baggage handling system, to indicate that the musicians were leaving. Gabriel opened the last and largest piece of luggage over the trap door, and each musician stepped into the luggage and disappeared. Gabriel closed this large suitcase and appeared to struggle with it toward the center stage where a blue-lit dome descended from above to cover and conceal him.