THE BATTLE DRUMS

Frédéric Soupa

Christian Vander was one of the first drummers to play on a metal drum kit, giving him the appearance of a warrior; with a bass drum cannon adorned with metal Zeuhl logos. "Asba offered to construct a drum kit for me," he remembers. "I calculated the sizes and envisaged some of the casks a little longer, to obtain a more compact and profound sound. It was the first metallic kit. It inspired all of them that came afterwards. The sound was terrific. I still have it but I don't use it any more. It's a magnificent instrument which served me at the beginning of Magma."

Around the same period, Vander conceived a system for positioning thirty-two drums: "Sixteen on each side without cluttering! It was a system of racks; the casks were placed like the pipes of an organ aimed towards the sky. I even devised a way to put the drums underneath me! The racks were feasible but would have cost a fortune. I approached that configuration with the cymbals. Billy Cobham did it with Octobans...

Eventually Christian Vander adopted a Gretsch kit of modest measurements (18" bass drum, 12" and 13" toms, 14" and 16" bass toms). He has remained faithful to the American make. Similarly with Zildjian cymbals, notably the model K, towards which he is particularly affectionate. But since Magma was put to sleep, Christian has reduced his enormous set (which numbered fifteen cymbals of which four were the giant Chinese Hu-Whan's). Three K's and a Charleston are currently sufficient for him. "When you've made a phrase and have changed the timbre fifteen times, you always come back to the same thing. In reality, with two good cymbals like the Zildjian K's, you can make a symphony. Sadly, it's impossible today to find this type of cymbal. The new ones are frozen, varnished, undesirable, you play them and there is nothing! One cannot work the sound towards the inside, they are flat, finished. You are obliged to change your style! Young drummers listen to records where the cymbals go 'tic-tic-tic' because often the engineers have compressed the sound, reducing the volume and the depth of the real tone. The brat who hears this wants to find the same sound when he goes in a shop. It's bad!" The music has therefore persuaded Vander to reduce his set: "In using tons of hardware one ends up deluding oneself. The ideal situation is to arrive at playing snare / Charleston / bass drum / cymbal for a very long while without being obliged to vary from more than one cask. It's the music which requests a certain colour and a medium...."