DAFT PUNK - DHIREN BAVISHI
Before forming Daft Punk, In1992 Guy Manuel DeHomem– Christo and ThomasBangalterformed a Bassand Guitar band with Laurent Brancowitz calling themselves as“Darlin”. Covering an original composition of“The Beach Boys” they also opened for stages shows in the UK, The band soon disbanded after a negative comment from a British magazine“Melody Maker” leaving Brancowitzpursue other efforts with“Pheonix”. This led to the formation of Daft Punk and they started experimenting with Drum Machine and Synthesisers in 1993. Soon they started sampling their own sounds Guy Manuelusually playing the Guitar, Bangalteron Keyboard and Bass.
Debuting their first single in 1994 “The New Wave” on Soma Quality Recordingswhich also contained the final mix called “Alive”. Returning to the studio in 1995 to record“Da Funk” the same year this became the duo’s first commercially successful single. Daft Punk started looking for a manager after the success and settled for “Pedro Winter” who regularly promoted them along with other artists. Slowlyduo’sstarted getting many offers from different recording labels and in 1996 they signed with “Virgin Records” who use to licence tracks for Daft Punk and major label companies.
February 1997 Daft Punk released their first commercial album “Homework” consisting of sixteen tracks of House Music. Bangalter said “It was supposed to be a load of singles, but we did so many tracks over a period of five months that we realized that we had a good album.” The tracks were set out in order of two disc of vinyl. Guy Manuel stated, “There was no intended theme because all the tracks were recorded before we arranged the sequence of the album. The idea was to make the songs better by arranging them the way we did to make it more even as an album. The Name Homework, related to that we made the record at home, very cheaply, very quickly and spontaneously, trying to do cool stuff”. Using their childhood memories to make music and promoting their album in their first concert “Daftendirktour’ around the world being a method and strategy. The due used their house equipment for the tour As Bangalter stated, “Everything was synched up, Drum Machines, Basslines, The Sequencer was just sending out the tempos and controlling the beats and bars. On top of this structure we built all these layers of samples and various parts that we could bring in whenever we wanted to.” “Around The world” was the successful single in the album and “Da Funk” was included for the soundtrack of the movie “The Saint” They also released collection of music videos for the album that was released in 1999 and titled as “D.A.F.T: A Story About Dogs, Androids, Firemen and Tomatoes”
Link to playlist - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lwzYTVs5JsKp8NenSdsfX1UxwEgh_A5Vk
Late 1999 saw them in studios working on their next album and on 26th February 2001 they released their second Daft Punk Album “Discovery” influenced by a sub-genre of Rock Music, Synth-Pop, Disco, Garage House and R&B. This album wasrecordedinBangalter’shouse inPariscollabThe tracks were set out in order of two-disc of vinyl. Edwards and DJ Sneakboth musically and lyrically. For this album, they used different Sampler and Synthesizers such as Akai MPC, E-Mu SP 1200, Oberheim DMX andLinndrum, Sequential Circuits, Roland SVC-350 and Auto-Tune. Like earlier, they used their childhood memories and influences from other musicians to make this album. They also released a collection of music videos for the album controlling the beats and bars. On top of this structure, we built all these layers of samples and around the world is could bring in whenever we wanted to.”
The album’s opening track “One More Time” features heavy Auto-Tune and Compressed vocals from Ramanthony
Auto-Tune used in “One More Time” “Discovery”
“Aerodynamic” has electric guitar arpeggiated solo which gives it a funk groove, “Digital Love” contains a solo performed by the duo using a Wurlitzer piano, Vintage Synthesizer and Music Sequencer.
WurltizerPiano used in “Digital Love” “Discovery”
“Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”, “Crescendolls”, “Nightvision”, “High Life”, “Something About Us”, “Voyager”, “Veridis Quo”, “Short Circuit”, “Face To Face” and “Too Long” are some of the track to be named from the same album. The duo adopted a Robot costume in all their concert shows claiming robots in their studio and that branded them from then onwards. “Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem” was an adult animated musical science fiction film directed by Kazuhisa Takenouchi supervised by Leiji Matsumoto to market their movie. They also launched Daft Club for exclusive tracks and bonus materials.
Following a tour in 2007, they started focusing on
“Human After All” was the third album of Daft Punk in 2005 which was unlike their previous albums, this album featured two guitars, two drum machine, a vocoder and one eight-track machine. The album consisted of 10 tracks starting from its title track “Human After All” which was charted in France along with “Robot Rock” and “Technologic” in several countries. This album topped Billboard Top Dance/Electronic Albums chart and peaked at number 98 on the Billboard 200. It was also nominated for 2006 Grammy Award for The Best Electronic/Dance Album but lost it to “The Chemical Brothers” album “Push The Button”. Daft Punk named a tour Alive 2006/2007 that featured all the tracks from the same album. Following a tour in 2007, they started focusing on future projects and other artists started sampling Daft Punk one of which is “Stronger” by Kayne West. The duo made a surprise appearance in 50th Grammy Award to before alongside Kayne and used Lemur Controller (Customized multi-touch device from French company JazzMutant)
JazzMutant’sLemur Controller device
8th February 2008 Daft Punk won their first Grammy for “Alive” and its single
“Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger”.
Later the same year Daft Punk provided 11 new mixes for a musical based video game “DJ Hero” using this as one of their strategy to promote their music, In 2009the duo composed 24 tracks for the movie “Tron: Legacy”, They also made a cameo appearance in the movie wearing their trademark robot helmets.
The duo started working on their fourth album “Random Access Memories” which was released on17thMay 2013 by Columbia Records. This album paid a tribute to late 1970sand early 1980s American music which was reflected on the cover of the album. 15 tracks with different artists who perform live starting from Pharrell Williams, Nile Rodger, Giorgio Moroder, ToddImperatrice, Noah Lennox, Garth Porter and many more. The recording took place in Henson Recording Studios, Conway Recording Studios and Capitol Studios in California. The duo wanted to record various instruments and use them for this album. The opening track “Give Life Back To Music” features guitar work by Nile Rodgers and Paul Jackson, drums by John Robinson and lyrics by Daft Punk using vocoders which was also the main instrument used in the second track “The Game Of Love” where they wanted to give people a robotic feel to express their emotions and expressiveness.
Vocoder used in “Give Life BackToMusic” and “The Game Of Love”
“Within” was one of the first track to be recorded for the album, A monologue by Moroder, Gonzales on piano and Daft Punk on the vocoder.“Get Lucky” with Pharrell Williams on vocals co-written by the duo and Nile Rodgers on guitar, this song gave a disco feel and has received acclaims from critics and spawned numerous cover versions and paradied. The single sold more than 9.3 million copies and reached the top ten in the music charts of over 32 countries making it one of the best-selling songs of all time. Spotify music streaming website reported that the song is the most-streamed new song in the service history.
Check the deconstruction of “Get Luck”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGZrZBq_Izw
“Get Lucky” won the record of the year in 56th Grammy Awards
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8V1yxdukFxo
“Random Access Memories” won the album of the year in 56th Grammy Awards
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncnBz6A14i0
Reference List -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8V1yxdukFxo - Daft Punk ‘Get Lucky’ Record of the year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncnBz6A14i0 - Daft Punk ‘Random Access Memory’ Daft Punk win Album Of The Year ('Random Access Memories') at the 56th GRAMMY Awards. https://eu.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2014/01/26/grammy-awards-news/4903161/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGZrZBq_Izw ‘ Get Lucky’ Deconstruction