For those of you who keep up with what others are up to while U2 aren’t on the road…Willie Williams has been busy with Darren Hayes - the former lead singer of Savage Garden. Hayes released a solo album and embarked on his Time Machine Tour during ‘07-’08, which has been recently released on DVD.

According to GayWired.com, Willie designed the tour and had costumes designed by the Royal Shakespeare Company. (Another U2 reference: Bono and Edge wrote music for the RSC for A Clockwork Orange in 1990.)

Hayes mentioned why he wanted to work with Willie in the article:

…during the making of the album it started to become this theatrical concept that this bird was a time machine and I was going to tell a story about myself… about revisiting my childhood, revisiting the pain, making peace with it and that kind of thing.

That intrigued Willie Williams, the show designer. Willie usually works with U2 and The Rolling Stones and does these massive, massive productions but I guess it was one of those great moments where he was looking for something simple and quiet and designed and theatrical. He had a copy of the album for a good six months before it came out. So I guess it was gestating for a long, long time and it was just one of those perfect situations creatively where everybody basically got to do what they were really wanting to do….As I’ve gotten older, a few things have come into place. Willie Williams is a mentor to me. He’s someone who has taught me so much. He sees something in me that, for whatever reason, he has decided to encourage and to nurture.