She's Just That Kind of Girl

Twenty-Nine | Violet

Day two into dress rehearsals after finishing stage rehearsals, I felt more confident, more excited. Still nervous and anxious for sure, but more so just excited to see and perform for our fans again. Sing for our fans again. All the things I truly love rushing back into my life again.

We were working on Act Two of the Viciously Precious Tour. Four acts and two stages total for this dramatic but daring theatrical performance. Act One was kingdom-themed with a crumbled ice castle, three thrones rising up on a lift. Two crumbled columns with the Heartbreak Kingdom logo on the banners, stone walkways radiating off the screen catwalks as an awesome illusion.

Act Two becomes pirate acting basically. The stage designers crafted our pirate ship vision to life with stairs cascading out the side to get to the walkways, the only true thing preventing this ship from looking like a real one because it's also engineered to rock back and forth gently at certain points with a sea projecting on all screens, including the side catwalks. The prominent middle screen catwalk will replicate a plank, a bright idea by Selena. The crumbled columns become masts with a net you could climb, which is one entrance Selena planned to make for one of the shows. Extra masts also pop out in the middle of the two adjacent catwalks with red-eyed sea dragons coiling up them, breathing fire.

The last two acts are my personal favorite in terms of everything. Costumes, dance numbers, the props, stage design, lighting, confetti-fun, and of course, the setlist that brings the magic together for the fans.

Act Three involved the second stage known as Stage B. A large rectangular piece of Stage B becomes a lift that sits on the main stage at first with us on it. It's decorated with realistic-appearing homemade clouds, —it seriously only involved balloons, tape, flour, newspaper, and pillow stuffing—lights, and fog machines to create the allure of the clouds moving as we did in the air. By the time we finish the acoustic version of our song, Lips On A Girl, the rectangular stage lift piece will become one with the rest of Stage B and a piano will ascend through the trap door on the stage lift from within Stage B. That's where our gorgeously custom-made angel wings piano currently rests until we reach that part of rehearsal.

Stage B sits in front of the main stage within the audience to give an exceptional experience. It's designed as a sort of short strip where the center is a rectangle that's crossable to the two steps on either side that end in giant circles, a square lift on each circle brings up lamp posts that shine lights and hang clouds from them. The entire stage fogs up colorfully by machines that also foreshadow the last act, which is probably my most favorite act, if I had to choose.

The final act sets the fans in London with a skyscraper of a Ben Clock Tower in the back-right corner of the main stage. More fog in intriguing colors of red, pink, and purple set the mysterious mood around the stage design. The screen catwalks resemble brick walkways and the giant seamless screen creates a background feel of what it's like to wander London in the dead hours of the night. The trees, bushes, bench, and lamp posts really threw the illusion together. Each lift on the catwalks also have their own lamp posts, the last two on the corner ends have their own benches as well. The only lighting at first is a spotlight light that illuminates our silhouette, so we appear as striking shadow figures. The song Persona(L) kicks off this intimidating and powerhouse dance number with our elegant walking staffs, dancers, and oversize-brimmed fedoras that hides our upper face, accenting our bold lipstick colors. We end it by a fast twirl and send on our hats flying into the stadium for fans to catch as souvenirs on the last dance step. Stella and the last mashup jam songs Masquerade, Bad Temper, and W0W end the show with a wonderful, rainbow blast of never-ending, heavy confetti.

We've always had our hands in every single thing we do for our music. From costume designs, stage designs, tour planning, the music and lights setup, the selection of our dancers, and the setlist. We felt so proud and ecstatic seeing the creation all come together at the end before the start of a tour, but for me this time around it all felt very different.