On a serious note, I was always the kid that sat in class drawing set designs that I would love to see. Long: I got drunk one night and ended up in the back lounge of the Go Go’s tour bus. On one of the shows at a local amphitheater, I met the production manager that would put me on my first tour.
Unfortunately for them, it got worst! A regional lighting and sound rental house came through for a fall concert and I was one of the stagehands–I ended up working for Rainbow Concert Productions for about 5 years. They coerced me into going to a small liberal arts school in Vermont in the hopes that I would grow out of the desire to become a roadie. I went home and told my parents that I wanted to go on tour and light bands. After seeing my first concert as a senior in high school I realized that my real love was the way that lighting reacts to music at a show.
I fell in love with lighting the body and the music in our dance productions. When my dance teacher (Cheri Skurdall) asked her students to join the tech crew for extra credit, I instantly volunteered. When did you know this was something you wanted to pursue?
Lighting and production design is such a specific career-it’s so technical and artistic all at once. Billboard caught up with Routhier and Long to discuss their passion for show design, the process of bringing a concert to life, and why The Weeknd is “the Nine Inch Nails of R&B.” Recently, SRae productions worked with The Weeknd on lighting Es Devlin's set design for the pop star's explosive “ Starboy: Legend of the Fall” 2017 world tour. “We create ‘moments’ in the show that when properly placed in the set list, help guide the audience through different emotions through visuals and music.” “We design and create shows with custom scenic, video, lighting, effects, pyro, automation moves-everything you can think of,” Routhier says. Show production-an sophisticated and vital component to any musician’s career-is the art of enhancing the audience’s experience to its fullest level. “By the third song of Chevelle’s set, I was sold.” The two have been working together since as business partners, forming the design company SRae Productions and working with artists like Halsey, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Die Antwoord, and The Weeknd. “As I remember it, I took a seat in the balcony behind the lighting position, and just sat back and watched,” Long tells Billboard. Long, a Louisiana-based show designer and creative director, needed a last minute replacement for a show he had designed and was referred to Routheir’s work-at the time, she was a lighting director on tour with the band Chevelle. In less than a week the song was streamed over 17 million times worldwide.When Sooner Routhier and Robert Long met in 2005, it was creative love at first sight. The title track with Daft Punk broke the record at its release of 'Most Release Weekend Streams Ever'. His fourth studio album 'Starboy' is released at the end of November 2016.
'Earned It' (Fifty Shades of Grey) even garnered The Weeknd his first ever Academy Award® nomination in the category of 'Best Original Song'. Tickets are on sale via Starting off his career anonymously, The Weeknd first broke into the music scene with the 2011 mixtape House of Balloons followed by studio album Kiss Land in 2013 and the widely recognized Beauty Behind the Madness that earned him two Grammy Awards in 2015, an RIAA triple-platinum certification for cumulative sales in excess of 3 million, 16 RIAA certifications from tracks alone with 'The Hills', 'Can’t Feel My Face', 'Often', 'In The Night', and 'Acquainted'. The tour will be stopping at the Ziggo Dome on the 24th of February. Grammy Award-winning and multi-platinum selling music artist The Weeknd has unveiled details behind his first-ever world tour – Starboy: Legend of the Fall 2017.