Discovery (Daft Punk album)

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Discovery
Studio album by Daft Punk
Released March 13, 2001
Recorded 1998–2000
Daft House (Paris, France)
Genre House
Length 61:00
Label Virgin
Producer Daft Punk
Professional reviews
Daft Punk chronology
Homework
(1997)		 Discovery
(2001)		 Alive 1997
(2001)
Alternate covers
Limited edition Japan cover
Reverse of limited edition Japan cover
Singles from Discovery
  1. "One More Time"
    Released: December 5, 2000
  2. "Aerodynamic"
    Released: March 28, 2001
  3. "Digital Love"
    Released: August 21, 2001
  4. "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"
    Released: October 13, 2001
  5. "Face to Face"
    Released: October 10, 2003
  6. "Something About Us"
    Released: November 14, 2003

Discovery is the second studio album by the French house duo Daft Punk, released on March 13, 2001. It marks a shift in the sound from Chicago house, which they were previously known for, to disco, post-disco[1] and synthpop-inspired house.

The album provided itself as a soundtrack to the anime film Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem, which was a collaboration between the creators of the album, Leiji Matsumoto, and Toei Animation. All of the music videos for the tracks on the album are segments of the film. Interstella 5555 follows a story of a kidnapped extraterrestrial band. Discovery is recognized as a concept album in reviews by New Musical Express and Spin magazines.[2][3]

Early versions of the album included a "Daft Club" membership card. The card included a code which granted access to an online music service, which featured tracks later released on the album of the same name and Alive 1997.

Contents

[edit] Theme

According to an interview with Remix Magazine Online, Thomas Bangalter stated:

This album has a lot to do with our childhood and the memories of the state we were in at that stage of our lives. It's about our personal relationship to that time. It's less of a tribute to the music from 1975 to 1985 as an era, and more about focusing on the time when we were zero to ten years old. When you're a child you don't judge or analyze music. You just like it because you like it. You're not concerned with whether it's cool or not. Sometimes you might relate to just one thing in a song, such as the guitar sound. This album takes a playful, fun, and colorful look at music. It's about the idea of looking at something with an open mind and not asking too many questions. It's about the true, simple, and honest relationship you have with music when you're open to your own feelings.[4]

[edit] Production

A significant amount of sampling is present on the album. The sampled tracks reinforce Thomas Bangalter's statement about Discovery's theme. Rather than simply creating new music out of the samples, Daft Punk worked with them by writing and adding instrumental performance.[5] The Discovery liner notes specify permitted use of samples for four tracks on the album: Part of George Duke's "I Love You More" is featured in "Digital Love"; Edwin Birdsong's "Cola Bottle Baby" was sampled for "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"; The Imperials song "Can You Imagine" is used for "Crescendolls"; Barry Manilow's "Who's Been Sleeping In My Bed" is credited for "Superheroes".

Several websites list many other samples present on the album, but Bangalter has stated that half of the samples listed are not true. He also stated the sampling they do is legitimately done, not something they try to hide.[6] Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo estimated that half of the sampled material on Discovery was played live by the duo:

“ I play more guitar usually, and Thomas plays more keyboards and bass. There's no ego involved. We don't argue about who's playing what. You can get the sound of a guitar with a keyboard, or the opposite. We don't really care about who's doing what as long as it's well-done. At the same time, when you use samples, you don't have this problem. When you use a sampler, nobody plays on it, so the problem of the ego of the musician is not really there. For everything that we do, no matter how you get to the results, the important thing is the result.[7] ”

Leiji Matsumoto supervised the creation of several music videos for Discovery. The videos later appeared as scenes in the feature-length film Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem. It was created as a collaboration between Matsumoto, Daft Punk, Cédric Hervet and Toei Animation. The film features the entire album as its soundtrack. Regarding the album from the perspective of animation, Daft Punk stated that, "We think the music we made on Discovery has been done in a cinematic way in our minds. We were visually seeing the music and trying to find ideas that were appealing to people's imagination. An animation fan would find this mixture of elements and story in our music."[8]

[edit] Musical features

The albums is notable for the two guest appearances of Romanthony and Todd Edwards, which are the only artists to appear on any Daft Punk albums to date. In regard to working with them de Homem-Christo stated:

“ We met Romaanthony at the 1996 Winter Music Conference and became friends. Before that, we mentioned his name on “Teachers,” thanking him for his influences. We wanted to invite him to sing with us because he makes emotional music. What's odd is that Romanthony and Todd Edwards are not big in the United States at all. Their music had a big effect on us. The sound of their productions, the compression, the sound of the kick drum, and Romanthony's voice... The emotion and soul is part of how we sound today. Because they mean something to us, it was much more important for us to work with them than with other big stars.[9] ”

Giving his take on working with them, Bangalter stated:

“ We wanted to work with Romanthony and Todd Edwards on our first album. They didn't know who we were at the time, so it was very difficult to convince them. When we met Romanthony in Miami, he told us he was very into what we were doing, which made us very happy. They are the house producers who were the biggest influence on us. Working with them was a way for us to close the circle. It was very important for us to do that, because they are part of what we do. Now that we've worked with them, we are free to explore other areas. It will be interesting to see what we'll do next. Now we can work with other people.[10] ”

[edit] Reception

Upon release, critics noted the immediate style differences of Discovery from Homework. The change in aesthetic was a jarring move for fans of Daft Punk's earlier work and initially caused some critics to pan the album. Q rated the album five stars out of five, an unusual occurrence for the magazine. Discovery has gained praise few years after its release, the album being ranked #12 in Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of 2000-04 and #3 in their Top 200 Albums of the 2000s despite receiving an initial rating of 6.4.[11][12]

Regarding the album's structure, the magazine Spin noted that, "It feels like a concept album -- in this case, the story of how wine-flow disco circumnavigated intellectual pretensions on all sides en route to a temporary utopia that may finally believe in nothing but the boogie but still has the infinite on its mind every minute."[2] NME referred to Discovery as "audaciously weird" and added: "With its famously camera-shy creators now dressing as funkadelic Power Rangers, it is also something of a concept album."[3]

The album peaked at #2 in the United Kingdom and #44 in the United States. Discovery has sold at least 2.6 million copies as of 2005.[13] Two cult hits were spawned from this album: "One More Time" and "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". The song "Face to Face" (featuring Todd Edwards) reached #1 on the Billboard Club chart in 2004. The album was included on BBC Radio One Masterpieces in December 2009 presented by Zane Lowe, further highlighting the progression of the reception of the album and showing how highly regarded the album is amongst fans and fellow dance artists.

Several songs from the album would later be sampled by other artists. Kanye West's song "Stronger" from the album Graduation features a vocal sample of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". It was later performed live at the 2008 Grammy Awards with Daft Punk in their trademark pyramid while Kanye West was on stage rapping.[14] Wiley's song "Summertime" from the album See Clear Now features a sample of "Aerodynamic".[15] Jazmine Sullivan's song "Dream Big" from the album Fearless features a sample of "Veridis Quo".

[edit] Track listing

All songs are written by Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, except where noted.

  1. "One More Time" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Anthony Moore) – 5:20
  2. "Aerodynamic" – 3:27
  3. "Digital Love" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Carlos Sosa, George Duke) – 4:58
  4. "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Edwin Birdsong) – 3:45
  5. "Crescendolls" – 3:31
  6. "Nightvision" – 1:44
  7. "Superheroes" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Barry Manilow, Marty Panzer) – 3:57
  8. "High Life" – 3:22
  9. "Something About Us" – 3:51
  10. "Voyager" – 3:47
  11. "Veridis Quo" – 5:44
  12. "Short Circuit" – 3:26
  13. "Face to Face" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Todd Imperatrice) – 3:58
  14. "Too Long" (Bangalter, de Homem-Christo, Moore) – 10:00

[edit] Personnel

  • Daft Punk – sequencers, samples, synthesizers, vocals, vocoders, drum machines, programming, production, concept, art direction
  • Romanthony – lyrics, vocals on "One More Time" and lyrics, vocals, co-production on "Too Long"
  • DJ Sneak – lyrics on "Digital Love"
  • Todd Edwards – lyrics, vocals, co-production on "Face to Face"
  • Nilesh Patel – mastering
  • Alex & Martin – concept, art direction
  • Cedric Hervet – concept, art direction
  • Gildas Loaëc – concept, art direction
  • Simon Scott – concept, art direction
  • Daniel Vangarde – concept, art direction
  • Pedro Winter – concept, art direction
  • Mitchell Feinberg – liquid metal photos
  • Luis Sanchis – piano photo
  • Tony Gardner & Alterian – bionics engineering
  • Tamiyuki "Spike" Sugiyama – Tokyo connector

[edit] References

  1. ^ (2001) CMJ New Music Monthly - Best New Music - Daft Punk (Discovery): "Although it's only fair to credit Chicago with the post-disco dance style's paternal rights, the French [Daft Punk] have (at the very least) earned covered weekend privilegies." Publisher: CMJ Network, Inc. No. 93. p. 71. ISSN 1074-6978
  2. ^ a b NME Review
  3. ^ a b Spin magazine, June 2001, page 145.
  4. ^ Chris Gill, "ROBOPOP - An Interview with Daft Punk"
  5. ^ Bryan Reesman, Interview at mixonline.com
  6. ^ Daft Punk speak out on sample sources: 'half of this list is not true' Retrieved on July 18, 2007.
  7. ^ http://mixonline.com/mag/audio_daft_punk
  8. ^ Daft Punk Interview cartoonnetwork.com, archived from June 27, 2004. Retrieved on September 16, 2007.
  9. ^ http://remixmag.com/mag/remix_robopop
  10. ^ http://remixmag.com/mag/remix_robopop
  11. ^ "The Top 100 Albums of 2000-04". Pitchfork. 7 February 2005. http://pitchfork.com/features/staff-lists/5956-the-top-100-albums-of-2000-04-part-one/9/. Retrieved 2 October 2009. 
  12. ^ "The Top 200 Albums of the 2000s: 20-1". Pitchfork. 2 October 2009. http://pitchfork.com/features/staff-lists/7710-the-top-200-albums-of-the-2000s-20-1/2/. Retrieved 2 October 2009. 
  13. ^ Daft Punk Embraces Universal Themes... PR Newswire. Retrieved on July 25, 2007.
  14. ^ Daft Punk Make Surprise Grammy Appearance with Kanye West nme.com. Retrieved on February 10, 2008.
  15. ^ Grime Music Cleans Up in the Charts The Independent. Retrieved on August 21, 2008.

[edit] External links

v • d • e
Daft Punk
Thomas Bangalter · Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo
Studio albums
Homework · Discovery · Human After All
Other albums
Singles
Filmography
Related
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