We’ve Been Here Before. It is indeed a well-chosen name for Chinese Man’s latest album and current tour, which in many respects is a 20-year retrospective of the iconic trio’s career and their profound influence on music — an influence that is felt well beyond their signature hip hop sound and their native France. Lighting and Production Designer Drichos is celebrating this story with all of its myriad cycles on the tour with a deeply evocative show that he is running on his ChamSys MagicQ MQ500M Stadium Console.
“The specifications and the mood board for this show were ambitious, as the last album and this tour is a look back on the musical journey of the group,” said Drichos, who was given carte blanche by the band when creating the design. “Our main question was what remains of our music from before? How has it evolved? And sometimes we realized we had the impression of déjà vu, of cycles, and a touch of nostalgia, always with the same musical involvement.”
But, as fans of Chinese Man are well aware, this album and tour are not only about where the group “has been,” but also about the expansive places they’re heading. The three genre-busting artists from Région Sud thrive on renewal and discovery as much now as ever.
This is evident in their current album, and it’s also beautifully plain to see in the show Drichos has created for their tour, a design marked by stunning contrasts of light and shadows, haunting silhouettes, phantasmatic images, and most dramatically, a gyroscope that underscores the dimension of time. “The idea of the Gyroscope immediately seemed obvious to me when starting this design,” said Drichos. “It represents the cycle, the verticality, the journey through time.– so I based the scenography and the lighting of the show on this gyroscope by Vectorizing my ‘3D ideas.’
“This very ambitious proposal immediately seduced the artists when we proposed it to them,” continued Drichos. “We can even see pieces of gyroscope on the cover of the album. So, we launched the production of three gyroscopes of 2.5m wingspan. Two of the rings are motorized by gyroscope with infinite rotation and matrix LED cladding. Each gyroscope supped above each top of each top of each musician and motorized by nine winches.”
Taking this vision a step further, Drichos conceptualized and created three platforms and desks for the musicians with pixel-mappable LED strips representing half gyroscopes. He also had a see-through video screen arching around them to immerse the audience completely in their timeless universe.
Drichos credits his team, (Electrician & Network Manager Mathieu Zangrillo and Technical Direction Creator Deadline, as well as Kellook who assembled the gyroscope.) with making the show work to perfection. He also had praise for his ChamSys desk.
“The choice of the console for this tour seemed obvious to me right away, so I opted for a MQ500M from ChamSys,” he said. “First of all, it is a robust console that can withstand and endure a whole tour. Secondly, the morphing possibility for the patch is essential on tour and at festivals to save time retyping shows with the available local lighting fixtures, as well as the Patch offset for the positions of the fixture. Moreover, the integrated 3D visualizer and media player as well as the user-friendly timecode made it a perfect fit for our endeavor. “
Given the number of universes demanded by his stunning gyroscopes, Drichos had another reason to select the MagicQ MQ500M — it supports up to 256 universes direct from the console. During the courses of this tour those universes are being put to good use creating a show, which, like the music it supports, take fans on a transcendent journey where the cycle of past, present and future are joined by music.
Further information about ChamSys: www.chamsysusa.com
