Backstreet Boys on science fiction themes of the sphere

2001: A Space Odyssey. Star Wars. Star Trek. Tron. Blade Runner. Akira. The fifth element. Interstellar. Superman. Flash Gordon. The matrix. It looks like a list of the greatest science fiction films of all time, but in fact, it is a list of the films mentioned during a discussion on the inspirations behind the new popular residence of the backstreet boys on the sphere in Las Vegas, in Nevada.

Last July, one of the largest groups of boys of all time celebrated the 20th anniversary of their emblematic album, MillenniumOn the technologically advanced site, with two months of closed window shows that have generated a ton of buzz and interest. Consequently, two other months of shows have recently been added, and Io9 spoke to Baz Halpin, CEO and founder of Silent House, on this subject. Silent House was one of the many crucial societies for the creation of the show, and Halpin explained how a love of science fiction helped to create what some, like director Joseph Kahn, called the “best concert that I have ever seen”.

“It’s. Est. Expelling”, Kahn, who made two of the group’s most emblematic videos – the “everyone (everyone (backstreet’s back)” and science fiction “greater than life” – were returned to X. “You think I’m kidding. I don’t do it. Star Wars In 1977, transformed into a concert. You have to see it to believe it. Well, as we have seen and he’s right.

Halpin is a prolific producer of live events. He produced the part-time show of the Super Bowl in 2024 of Usher, the presidential inauguration of Joe Biden, the recent Tudum of Netflix and Taylor Swift The Eras tour Film, to name just a few. In terms of concert tours, he helped produce and design shows for Taylor Swift, Pink, Britney Spears, Usher, Harry Styles, and more. Recently, he worked on the Eagles residence in The Sphere and was contacted for the first time about the Backstreet Boys in November 2024. Shortly after, he and his team had proposed a list of sets and a global concept, which they presented to the group.

“It was” Into the Millennium “, 20 years of the album (and) it’s seminal for so many people,” Halpin told io9 about video chat. “We remember what it was. We remember the clips. We can remember what they looked like. We can remember the brand, if you wish. So I knew I wanted it to be some sort of futuristic science fiction, but I knew that we must (also) have all the ballads. We had to have all the romance.”

To create this balance, Halpin decided to do something that sphere concerts had not done before: tell a complete and coherent story. “I said to myself:” Okay, great, we will make a space opera, “he said.” We will do everything in space and … try to tie everything visually from start to finish. But what could we use who is relevant for Millennium? It could be our device to link this thing together without feeling like a film and always living in a space to feel like a pop concert? And so I had the idea of ​​a spacecraft. The spaceship is Millennium And that’s what takes us through the thing. It was therefore a big swing to put all our eggs in this rigid basket of a trip from start to finish, but I think that is what makes the best experience in the sphere, when you can have your cake and eat it too. “”

And that’s what it is. While the show begins, a giant spacecraft with the word “millennium” at the back flies in the place and then embarks on space. And while science fiction fans will clearly see a large spacecraft with the word “millennium” and will think of Millennium Falcon In Star WarsHalpin came to this achievement a little later than the public. “I am a total Star Wars nerd, “said Halpin.” But believe it or not, it only told me that Millennium And Millennium Falcon (were linked) when I yawn trying to design the ship with our visual counterparts (at Blink Inc.). We needed something that seemed huge. Like almost to evolve … but also felt agile, and the Millennium FalconFor me, has always been this thing. It seemed that it should not be agile, but when he moved, it was really the case, and so I unconsciously think that it completely played. “”

This mixture of direct and indirect inspiration continued from one song to another. “Get has another boyfriend”, for example, the eighth song of the show, sees the boys in a very neo-black setting with floating transport above, imposing buildings in mist and small vehicles leading to neon lights. It looks a lot like Blade runner Or Akira, With a hint of Tronwhich were all part of the design, up to a point. “Then the Tron The benchmark was actually something we try to get away from it, “said Halpin.” At first they were in fact bikes with wheels. And I said, “I don’t want that. If anything, they should look more like speed bikes. So I dive on all this concept on different types of speed bikes. And I didn’t want a trail. I didn’t want a lightcycle path or something like that. But, you know, in this world, they will have a neon outline. They will have a kind of lighting. It’s difficult because Tron … was so aesthetically singular, it is difficult to have a LED outline about anything, and someone does not say: “It is Tron. ‘”

In “The Call”, the penultimate song of the show, the green code lines go up and descend the whole sphere. It shouts The matrixEspecially since the two share the crucial element of a telephone call. However, it was a question of evoking this feeling, of not copying it. “In the Eagles, for the elongated eyes ”, we made this moment when the handwritten lyrics of the song came down vertically like a chandelier, then they spoke them,” said Halpin. “It’s just an incredible effect, so I knew that long thin text bands of a shape worked very well.” Using real telephone numbers linked in different ways to Backstreet boys, the figures move like The matrixBut then build and create shapes to remove what Halpin calls “sphere tips”.

“Create a box, create a tunnel, create a cone, create a curve,” said Halpin. “We wanted blocks that would allow us to make the tips of the sphere and portray the phone numbers, (but) it is difficult to move away Matrix connotation. “”

“Stop playing games”, one of the first strokes the earliest boys, sees the group in an endless waterfall of block arrangements, which are built to form a larger structure. Fundamentally, it looks like a giant game of TetrisHalpin thought was very aware. “I was very aware of Tetris and aware of trying to find all the ways in which it is not Tetris“He said.” Mainly, we build a house. The lines do not disappear. There are things inside. None of the forms have the same forms. »»

And yet, the Tetris Look came only after another famous science fiction inspiration did not quite correspond. “We had trouble for a long time with this song,” said Halpin. “I knew I wanted this song to be our surreal, colorful and crazy thing. If anything, it would be more like a Fifth element Luc Besson Vibe. But the reason why we ended up with the blocks is that I wanted a sphere tour where something fell on us … and therefore the construction of a wall, where it is slow, it is continuous, it happens throughout. We get the tip of the sphere that they can appear from the infinity, then able to fall on us. This is how it ended up being different blocks in shapes rather than flat horizontal lines, just to give us some interesting. “”

However, ideas have not always been concluded. Halpin explained that because the effects in the films are so good these days, and the public is so exploited in what is real and what is not, they expect a certain level of quality. So, if their effects could not at least correspond to what you would see in a theater, they went to another direction. “We tried to make a black hole like Interstellar, And we couldn’t make it appear almost as well as Interstellar“, He said.” So we abandoned him. »»

“Into the millennium” opened its doors in Sphere on July 11, so all of this and more were set up for less than a year. This is partly due to the work of Halpin and his team at Silent House Studios, which provided the concept, creative direction, design and production, as well as Blink Inc., which was the main content design studio; Sphere Studios, who was in charge of ensuring that all this idea and this technology gathered in the place; And, of course, back street productions. It was a lot of work, but for Halpin, the moment when he realized that everything had met was a few weeks before the opening.

“Different members (Backstreet boys) arrived at different times and had different levels of involvement, but Nick (Carter) came to the show-And-Tell with his daughter and sat behind me,” he said. “Hearing his reaction, seeing him for the first time, was this validation which not only corresponds to their atmosphere and they are in it, but they are also blown away, even if they know what is happening.”

After a first series of shows that succeed in success and buzzing, which then happens for the “Into The Millennium Tour” of the Backstreet Boys in The Sphere is more shows. Tickets were recently put up for sale for 14 additional performances from December 2025 to February 2026. And who knows? It may not be the end. After all, everyone knows that Backstreet is still coming back (okay).

Whatever happens, however, Halpin is just happy that his cheesy inspirations, which used this incredible place, helped Backstreet boys to celebrate 20 years of their emblematic album. “I am delighted for them,” he said, “I think they deserve every moment. I think people have probably underestimated their power when they have been announced as a group, and I think that people see that they are the perfect group for the sphere.”

Information and tickets on the dates of December, January and February “at the Millennium” can be found here. I know I go back for a second turn. Will I see you there?

Here is a video that we have gathered with some of these moments.

Do you want more iO9 news? Find out when you expect the latest Marvel outings, Star Wars and Star Trek, what is the next step for the DC universe on cinema and television, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.