Daft Punk - Random Access Memories

Everyone's Favorite Robots Make the Best Album of the Year

It's been eight years since Daft Punk released the electronic heavy, powerhouse “Human After All”, and in that time the duo of Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo have gotten back to their disco funk roots. “Random Access Memories” reminds us that they are just as comfortable with percussion and guitars as they are with synthesizers and drum machines. Song after song is interesting and catchy, making “Random Access Memories” the best album so far this year.

Daft Punk didn't work alone on this one. Pharrell Williams brings his soulful voice and hit making ability to the already classic “Get Lucky” and the inherently cool “Loose Yourself to Dance”. “Instant Crush” features Julian Casablancas, who manages to get his trademark vocals to shine through the use of a vocoder. The piano provided by Chilly Gonzales is intricate and beautiful in “Within” which will blend nicely with the “Discovery” track “Face to Face” in a live setting. Perhaps the best collaboration comes from Paul Williams on the spacey yet ragtime influenced track “Touch”. Williams, who previously worked with The Muppets on “Rainbow Connection”, has a knack for making audiences empathize with inhuman characters, like puppets or in this case robots. The result is beautiful and tragic and provoke feelings reminiscent to watching David, the child robot, stare at his potential savior The Blue Fairy in the film "A.I."

Daft Punk - Lollapalooza 2007

References to Stanley Kubrick, who wrote "A.I.", are also apparent in the interstellar track “Motherboard” which conjures the unsettling sounds of a nearby monolith. It seems the robots were very influenced by space on “Random Access Memories” with the tracks “ Beyond” and “Contact” evoking the wonder of the galaxy. Daft Punk come back down to earth with the fun, funky, disco tracks “Give Life Back to Music”, “Fragments of Time” and “Doin' It Right”. The inspiration of Chic guitarist Nile Rogers, who is featured on “Get Lucky”, is loud and clear.

In “Get Lucky”, Pharrell sings “Like the legend of the phoenix/all ends with beginnings”. It seems that Daft Punk are at a new beginning of their own. They are more popular now than ever, consistently in everyone's wish list to appear at musical festivals, and “Get Lucky” has become their highest charting hit in the U.S. “Random Access Memories” is a triumph in every sense of the word and as eager fans dive into the album, we can't help but imagine how amazing these tracks will sound live.

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