The secrets of The Hydro

10 special moments of The Hydro.

It’s two years next week since tickets went on sale for Rod Stewart, the opening act at the SSE Hydro.

It has since become the second-busiest live events arena in the world, after the O2 in London.

And the stunning £125-million building on the banks of the River Clyde in Glasgow has also become one of Scotland’s most famous and photographed icons.

Dad-of-two John Langford, the Head of Live Entertainment, is the man responsible for bringing the world’s top stars to Scotland.

John spills the beans on backstage goings-on and reveals his 10 special moments.

LIGHT FANTASTIC

We can light up the outside in 13 million different colours and we get loads of requests from charities asking us to change it to their colours for a day.

When Prince came we of course had it all purple and when Calvin Harris played here he had the lights outside linked to the changing colours he had on stage. So we were like the world’s biggest disco ball.

The most special for me, being South African, was when Nelson Mandela passed away. I knew he had a very special link with Glasgow so I had it lit up in the colours of the South African flag.

WALL OF SHAME

We USED to have an autograph wall. When Celtic-mad Rod Stewart played the first gig he signed a wall backstage actually with some quite controversial football comments.

That kind of kicked things off for other acts.

What we thought was going to be a nice autograph wall ended up having comments about other bands, tax dodging and all sorts!

Then one band, who’ll remain nameless, decided they really wanted to make a mark, and used black spray paint on it.

It was such a mess that we decided our great wall was to be no more, so we had to paint it over and put up some signed pictures instead.

MEAT-FREE MORRISSEY

When Morrissey played here in March he insisted the whole place be meat-free, because of his diet and beliefs about animals. He actually cancelled an Icelandic gig as the arena didn’t agree to his demands.

We replaced all our catering in the building with things like Quorn burgers and veggie stir fry.

But he also insisted there was no leather furniture, so we also had to take all of the couches and chairs out so as not to offend.

STILL STUNNED

I’m not Scottish, so I hadn’t a clue what Still Game was when we got the inquiry about them coming here.

In fact, it only really came on to my radar as they were talking about doing seven performances, which was unheard of. But then they kept rolling on the dates until they had 21.

That was absolutely phenomenal.

Obviously we had a bar designed like the Clansman pub and the Exhibition Centre station changed its name to Craiglang.

Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill appreciated wee touches like an old-fashioned bus destination sign with Craiglang on it we got for them. And they still joke about selling more tickets than Monty Python at the O2.

HOME FROM HOME

Mostly the stars stay at nice hotels but Dolly Parton arrived in her Dolly Mobile and what she called her “guard dogs” who travel everywhere with her. So we parked up this big mobile home outside the back door so she couldn’t have been handier.

FAN MANIA

Fans obviously love to get close to their idols and none more so than Enrique Iglesias.

A lot of acts now have what they call “B” stages, a smaller stage set among the audience to do a more intimate part of the gig.

The problem with Enrique was there was no link between the stages and it’d have been madness to try to get him through his screaming fans.

So, we popped him into a big flight case the stage gear usually goes in and the roadies wheeled him through with no one being any the wiser until he popped out at the other end.

BACKSTAGE ANTICS

As you can imagine, we’re used to just about anything and everything backstage.

When Lewis Hamilton came for the BBC Sports Personality Of The Year Awards, he arrived in his Formula 1 car and with his bulldog which was given its own dressing room.

The guys from The Script brought their own go-karts and used the concourse area as a race track.

And when Usher played here he rode about backstage on a gold-plated Segway two-wheeler.

CHERISHED KEEPSAKES

We always try to look after the artists and give them some little memory of their time in Scotland.

After 20 years as a concert promoter I know that if you give them a plaque it gets handed to a production person and is never seen again.

We gave Rod a Scottish hamper with Tunnock’s teacakes, shortbread and a bottle of whisky, John Bishop got a Scotland top, Top Gear got a car-shaped cake and we presented Paolo Nutini with a birthday cake.

THAT’S AMAZING

I’m actually not a big Take That fan but I have newfound respect after seeing their shows.

I walked in on song three and they already had pyrotechnics, confetti, explosions and flames that you wouldn’t typically get until the end.

It’s without a doubt the best arena show I’ve ever seen. Because it was the first show of their tour they had a mobile sound studio for rehearsals and then they were in here three days before doing full run-throughs to make sure it all went perfectly.

But that’s typical of the big names.

Beyonce was kicking her world tour off here and she arrived a full week ahead of time for rehearsals.

We have a wonderful photo of her in the middle of the night, perfecting her choreography.

SPECIAL PLACE

The Hydro has already become a really dear place for a lot of acts.

Before we were even open Simple Minds had announced dates and Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill wanted to see the place.

I took them on a walk-through the empty venue and they fell in love with it. They hadn’t produced a live DVD since about 1985 as Jim said they’d never found the perfect venue.

But even without an audience he said they knew this was the place and there and then decided they wanted to do a live DVD here.