Just last week I told you that Faith Evans teased that with her upcoming duet album The King & I (with her slain husband The Notorious B.I.G.), she planned to utilize a digital hologram of the rapper. Then with the announcement of the Bad Boy reunion tour, the idea of this hologram coming to life became even more real.
Well now according to Billboard, it has officially been confirmed that the Biggie hologram will make his first appearance in Faith’s soon to be released new video.
ARHT Media has landed the digital rights to Notorious B.I.G.‘s hologram. The partnership between the Los Angeles-based company and ByStorm Entertainment, who handles the late rapper’s estate alongside singer Faith Evans and Biggie’s mother Voletta Wallace, will helm the technology for the so-called “Humagram” of Christopher Wallace to perform in various capacities including on-stage delivery and music videos.
What sold Biggie’s family and estate was ARHT Media’s — “ARHT” stands for Augmented Reality Holographic Technology — innovative patented technology that begins with “the creation of a digital human, being it living, deceased in this case or even fictional,” says CEO Paul Duffy. “We have a very sophisticated transmission technology for beaming these digital humans through the public Internet to literally any point on the planet. These digital humans can scale to any size of venue so it can be in a window display, your living room or it could be in a 50,000-seat arena for a real-time delivery and display of this human hologram, that we call “Humagrams.””
“This project has been a long-time coming, and it is very special to me,” says Ms. Wallace. “Words can’t even capture how elated I am for the world to finally see my son again on stage and beyond. Christopher’s impact and legacy will not only live through his past work, but also the new experiences which have been made possible through ARHT Media.”
The first order of business for the Biggie Humagram is a music video appearance for the first single off Faith Evans’ duets compilation titled The King & I. Last month, the Brooklyn MC’s former wife revealed on Dame Dash’s radio show that a potential hologram tour was in the works, which Bharti confirms. “What we’re gonna start with is a video with the first single from The King & I then I think Faith wants to do a little tour,” he says. While he did not offer specific tour details, B.I.G.’s Bad Boy family, led by Puff Daddy, are set to perform a sold-out “One Night Only” show in Brooklyn’s Barclays Center on May 20, Biggie’s birthday. (On Monday, April 11, Diddy also announced a second Bad Boy show in Brooklyn with the hashtag#BADBOYFamilyReunionTour, teasing a possible trek.)
Are you ready for the return of The Notorious B.I.G. in 2016?
