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The top grossing tours thus far in 2017 include Guns ‘N’ Roses, U2 and Metallica. But the MVP of the 2017 touring season isn’t found in any of those bands. It is LeRoy Bennett. LeRoy Bennett may not be a household name, but he is one of the most trusted people in the entertainment business by the superstars.

How is this for a resume? The production and or lighting director for the current Paul McCartney, Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga tours. That justifies a damn. He also worked with Prince from 1980 to 1994, so he was the man during Prince’s Purple Rain tour. He has been with Nine Inch Nails for the last 18 years. He’s worked with Beyonce, Jay-Z, Deadmau5, the Weeknd, Madonna, Sade and countless more.

As you can imagine then, Bennett is a treasure chest of incredible stories from working up and close with so many of the biggest names in music. I sat down with him recently for an hour of stories about Prince, McCartney, Bruno and more as well as how Bennett got his start and the common traits all of these great artists share.

Steve Baltin: How do you balance all three of these tours on the road at the same time?

LeRoy Bennett: Once the show is up and running it is pretty much automatic because I do have my directors out there that maintain the shows and run the shows every day. So for the most part I can step away, but there are still things to do. I’m used to juggling, I’ve done it for so long now that it’s kind of second nature.

Baltin: How long have you worked with each of the three of them?

Bennett: I started with Paul I believe 16 years ago, pretty sure it was 2001. Gaga I started off the “Monster Ball Tour,” which that, I believe, is five years ago. And Bruno just about the same time, shortly after.

Baltin: You started with Prince, correct?

Bennett: I started off on his Dirty Mind album, which, at that point, was his third album, but really the one that started to get him notoriety.

Baltin: How did you meet?

Bennett: I left high school and moved right into rock and roll. I worked with a band that was from Rhode Island and did the club circuit up and down the east coast. Everybody in my family is musical, I just never had the balls to get on stage. I hated it, I was so self-conscious, I couldn’t do it. [But] I really wanted to be involved in the music industry. Since I was a young kid I always listened to music. So I worked with this band, they had a little lighting system that they carried around with them. And I ended up taking care of it. I learned very quickly I could perform musically through lights. So I worked with them for a little while, went back to Rhode Island, worked with a company there. I did my first tour back in ’77 or ’78. The lighting designer on that tour took me under his wing, showed me what it took to put a whole show together. I went from that company to a British company out here in L.A. The director of the company took me to dinner one night and said, “I know you want to be more than a technician. The next client that comes through that doesn’t have a lighting designer I’ll put your name for it.” So he called me a couple of months later and had a job for me. He goes, “His name is Prince.” I didn’t know who he was. I flew out here, met with his manager cause they were doing a video shoot at that time and about a month later I went down to Minneapolis to start the rehearsals. I worked with him for 14 years, did music videos, all the live performance on the Purple Rain movie, all the tour stuff. So it was an amazing career. He was a friend, we built his live branding together and he pretty much let me do what I wanted to do. We had a very close relationship and I learned with him. He did his job, I did my job. He was an amazing artist, but I could tell him anything and not be intimidated. That helped me a lot in my career cause I started at the top of the most intense people you could ever work with. And after that everything else was easy.

Baltin: Talk about the experience of putting together the stage show for Paul McCartney and some of the most hallowed songs in history.

Bennett: It’s very interesting working with him, particularly the first time. For me, the Beatles’ music specifically, and the solo stuff, is such an emotional point in musical history and points in people’s lives, it’s very specific to an era when you hear “Hey Jude” or any Beatles song. Those classic, iconic historical pieces of music are, for me, very visual, reminiscent of that period of time. And they have to be treated that way because the Beatles spanned so many different styles, which was crazy. They did hard rock with “Helter Skelter,” then the pop stuff, the psychedelic stuff, all over the place. It was like they discovered the crack in the door of the other world of music and they opened it up and took it all. Because Paul’s show is such a musical history lesson almost every song has to be treated as its own cinematic story. The first show I did with him in San Francisco, I remember looking around and you could just see all these people just bawling their eyes out because it brought back everything important to them. All this music keeps coming out and they’re like, “I know everything.” I don’t get nervous meeting any artist, but I did a little bit with him. But he’s so disarming and he sat me down on the couch and we started talking. Immediately I was completely at ease talking to him and over the time we were together at rehearsals and stuff you lose track of who he is and what you’re doing. Then he got on stage the first night in San Francisco and I went, “S**t, it’s that guy.” It’s like working with world treasures. I tell people I’m the luckiest man in the world to do what I do and work with all the artists that I have.

Baltin: Did you stay friends with Prince after you left him in ’94?

Bennett: We spoke on and off. The last time I actually sat down and talked to him was at the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame induction ceremony, he got inducted, but it was also George Harrison getting inducted, so it was the night of that infamous guitar solo for “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” So I was right there, but before all that he and I sat for about an hour and a half just talking about all the things we had done. I said, “I miss you” and he said, “I miss you too.” We just expressed how much we love each other and respect each other. It was an awesome conversation. I always thought, “Well, I really want to do one more thing with him, I have to do it.” And of course when I heard the news last year it was devastating to me. But I feel so blessed I got to spend the 14 years I did with him.

Baltin: Let’s talk Bruno. When you’re starting this current tour with him what is your process?

Bennett: I love Bruno, I have so much respect for him not just as an artist, but as a human being. And all artists have things about who they are. He’s very specific about things he likes. He has been heavily influenced by Prince, in a lot of ways, as well as Michael Jackson. But he speaks in a way that is very familiar to me because of the way Prince spoke. I know how to listen to an artist and understand the essence of what they’re saying. He has a very specific style and every time he does an album it is a reflection of an era, whether it’s the ‘70s, the ‘80s, this one being the ‘90s. It’s a hint of what things look like visually at that time, but with a twist on it so it’s modern.

Baltin: What is the common trait among all these successful artists?

Bennett: It is that attention to detail, it is the understanding of who they are as an artist. People like Paul, like Bruno, like Trent Reznor, they know exactly who they are. And detail is so important to them. The detail makes you stand out beyond anybody else. A lot of it is understanding who you are as an artist and the belief in who you are as an artist. It was that way with Prince, he knew who he was. He knew everything about what it was to be him. And what it took to be a superstar. That’s why he rarely ever did any interview, you hardly knew very much about him because it was about the mystery. We all want to know everything until we know everything and then we don’t care anymore. Artists like Bruno, Trent Reznor, Paul, Prince and other artists I work with, understand how to dynamically take an audience on a musical trip.

Baltin: How long have you worked with Trent?

Bennett: I think it’s been 18 years. Trent, to me, is very much like Prince. Bruno is very much like Prince. These are all people I can relate to because there is a very common thread of who they are as an artist and how they think.