The last time Eric Jean-Jean saw the ex-Christine and the Queens was on stage at the Stade de France when he took the stage and sang 3SEX with Nicola Sirkis and Indochine. An invitation received as a great gift and an intense experience for the artist who hadn’t had the opportunity to do many concerts during the COVID period. Such an intense moment in this huge stadium where “every heart sends energy” which also makes the memory of this moment a little blurry. “It gave me an electric shock like when I came off stage. I got down on my knees and I prayed that one day, maybe, I too would have the chance to be able to share. Because it was very impressive to experience.”
Injured in the knee during rehearsals for his new show Redcar the adorable stars, he dislocated his knee at the last spinning of the residence, the singer was forced to postpone everything. An injury from which “Redcar” is recovering slowly but which made him think a lot and which he decided to take in a positive way: “I was looking for the little detail that made Redcar was Redcar and well, my knee answered”, “Redcar is prevented, but Redcar is sincere. And Redcar is furious, furious with love” concluded the singer.
For the #DriveRTL2 host “Redcar” is the present character of Christine and the Queens, then of Chris. And as a big Bowie fan that he is, he obviously thought about the arrival of Ziggy Stardust fromAladdin Sane and to Major Tom from the beginning, then from the clown of Ashes to Ashes. In short, a creation of characters to express something. A parallel that the singer of the Redcar project completely endorses “for me, my vow of honesty is manifested by my precision and precision. It is precisely the multiplicity or multiplicity of my names, because I am no longer the same as the one I was three years ago. And so, for me, the name is a poetic expression of myself and also a way of unlocking myself too, of allowing myself to become more before and I love the Bowie reference because for me, Bowie, he had this grace to be able to explain to express something very tenuous that he felt in him via his different avatars. And it is well said also Redcar, because it is the present of Christine and the Queens. Christine and the Queens, in the end it’s matrix. And then there was Chris and then there will be Redcar. And then I don’t think it will stop.”
A spiritual journey
An instinctive artistic approach of which the artist himself does not master the ins and outs “I am not in control of absolutely everything, but I have to be sincere”. “No, I don’t have an overall vision, but that’s why I continue. Otherwise I would stop, I think”.
This approach is also for him “a sincere quest for who I am, who, who who constantly reveals itself by different names. I almost use the name Upgrade now, because, as we say in English, it i.e. the name unlocks an additional reality for me and clarifies me”.
A description that makes you think of video games? “There’s a bit of that,” Redcar replies, “but what is reality? If I change my avatar, does my reality change? And in fact, that’s what fascinates me? Yes, in Actually, the answer is yes. If I change my avatar, my reality changes. But at the same time, I’m clarifying things I’ve always thought. So it’s a way to reaffirm my loyalty through endangerment. , risk taking”.
Eric Jean-Jean cannot help noticing thatthere is something spiritual in “Redcar”. A spiritual search in this evolution of his work.
A remark that interests him confirms “Redcar is a poet one is a poet with a red hand. The Archangel Michael with my red hands. Soon the arm. We hope for the whole body. Because red is the passion of life. It’s the blood Redcar is the family. We are family here? Redcar is a poet who prays to the Archangel Michael very strongly and who hopes to see the angels arrive one day.
A spiritual approach which moreover seems to have begun with the Christine and The Queens project: “music has always been a spiritual practice which has raised me. But it was more confused. When I was younger, it was more tenuous, I didn’t understand. The first songs I wrote, it was like light in my life, but I realized that more recently. And then I became more spiritual myself. Losing my mother and by understanding more things about life and death, through the mourning of this remarkable person who also teaches me a lot every day. And music, for me, is still very spiritual. In the end, it It’s very poetic. Finally, when you think that a song can help you get better or that you can put a memory in a song, it’s still It’s still very tenuous, magnificent. So the more I make music, the more I actually believe. So technically, if I keep doing it, I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
For the artist, the concert will be the culmination of his album. An album designed for the stage even more than the others. An album that he “wrote alone at home, in concert conditions.” A concert where we will not find Christine and the Queens nor Chris: “I do believe that it will be quite absolute because I don’t see the point of going back to Polaroids when I have new sensations to to discover. So here you go, you have to be ready. You have to be ready to embark with me on the new adventure. But it will also be a discovery I think, to go for them, for the people of the whole album, because it will be before the release of the album.”
Redcar will be on stage at Cirque d’Hiver on November 9th and 10th. The Scrapbook Redcar and The Adorable Stars will be released on November 11.
Christine and the Queens on RTL2: “Redcar is furious, furious with love”