Intimate photos of The 1975 rehearsing ‘At Their Very Best’
- Text by Emma Garland
- Photography by Courtesy of The 1975
The 1975’s ‘At Their Very Best’ isn’t just an arena rock tour. Wrapped within a sprawling two-storey house that screams both ‘90s sitcom’ and ‘Tennessee Williams play,’ the show is split into two acts. The first is a high concept meditation on the tortured artist trope, the relationship between art and consumerism and the modern masculinity crisis, in which frontman Matty Healy eats raw steak and does topless push-ups in front of a TV flashing images of Prince Andrew and misogynist grifter Andrew Tate; the second a more traditional parade of hits. Dramatising the subject matter and self-awareness of their songwriting, ‘At Their Very Best’ first challenges what a pop show should be – and then fulfils the bargain. As Healy has announced to audiences from the stage: “Welcome to the show about the show.”
Central to bringing all this to life is the award-winning light, stage and conceptual designer Tobias Rylander. A long-time collaborator of The 1975, Rylander worked closely with Healy from the beginning of the process.
“Matty is very creative in his thinking with never-ending interesting ideas,” Rylander tells Huck of how the concept came about. “He thinks ART when he creates and is also a very talented actor. I visited the band when they were recording their album and we spoke a lot about the theatre and how they wanted to encapsulate that into their tour.”
Keen to bring the process of a recording studio and rehearsing songs to the stage, the band and Rylander first came up with the idea of a room that could transform – as with a theatre production – which then led to the idea of the house.
“We theoretically wanted the set to be anyone’s house, due to the monochromatic nature of the design,” says Rylander. “We wanted to make sure that anyone could take a photo from anywhere in the audience, and it would be a great shot. The goal was to create a strong visual identity for each song, so that each song was able to be recognised from a single photograph.
“The house and street lamp are inspired by the artwork for their popular single ‘Falling For You’ and each lyric book on the house’s bookshelf represents each song on the set list,” he adds.
Sustainability was also at the forefront of the design: “We wanted to create as little landfill as possible. The house you see is modular and it can therefore ‘put it back on the shelf’ once the tour is over.”
The result is one of the most ambitious and innovative set designs in recent memory. It's also birthed perhaps the most iconic house in guitar music history since American Football's 1999 debut album (the Midwestern emo legends will, incidentally, be joining The 1975 for their biggest-ever headline show at London's Finsbury Park in July).
With songs sung from the roof lit by a single street lamp, a spiral staircase leading to nowhere, and the doorway lighting up in homage to the neon rectangle used in previous 1975 artwork and tours, the set is used to full effect – both as a physical space, and as an extension of the band’s lore.
“This tour is a continual evolution of the band and their creativity," says Rylander. "Most shows nowadays are full of big lights and LED screens, this was the complete opposite. We didn’t know whether people were going to like it or whether it would work. This tour is a celebration of where the band started to where they are now. We opted for a more organic, living and breathing set which provided me with the perfect opportunity to hide the lighting rather than showcase it.”
Latest on Huck
The party starters fighting to revive Stonehenge’s Solstice Free Festival
Free the Stones! delves into the vibrant community that reignites Stonehenge’s Solstice Free Festival, a celebration suppressed for nearly four decades.
Written by: Laura Witucka
Hypnotic Scenes of 90s London Nightlife
Legendary photographer Eddie Otchere looks back at this epic chapter of the capital’s story in new photobook ‘Metalheadz, Blue Note London 1994–1996’
Written by: Miss Rosen
The White Pube: “Artists are skint, knackered and sharing the same 20 quid”
We caught up with the two art rebels to chat about their journey, playing the game that they hate, and why anarchism might be the solution to all of art’s (and the wider world’s) problems.
Written by: Isaac Muk
The Chinese youth movement ditching big cities for the coast
In ’Fissure of a Sweetdream’ photographer Jialin Yan documents the growing number of Chinese young people turning their backs on careerist grind in favour of a slower pace of life on Hainan Island.
Written by: Isaac Muk
The LGBT Travellers fundraising for survival
This Christmas, Traveller Pride are raising money to continue supporting LGBT Travellers (used inclusively) across the country through the festive season and on into next year, here’s how you can support them.
Written by: Percy Henderson
The fight to save Bristol’s radical heart
As the city’s Turbo Island comes under threat activists and community members are rallying round to try and stop the tide of gentrification.
Written by: Ruby Conway