Daft Punk - Human After All

Yeah, all those other rumors turned out to be true. ;)

Thing is, based on the lovers/haters ratio on this thread I expected more negative reviews/reactions than HAA is getting at the moment.

The dance press are (obviously) more positive - Mixmag and DJ give it album of the issue status.

Matt DC had never even heard of Cut Copy last week! they're less indie more new wave revival i suppose. i didn't realise Zdar had had a hand in BLNL until last week either tho, i'm quite amazed by that.

lack of substance? hmmmm

ha, wonder if he heard my bootleg

'au contraire' cries Mr Smagghe?

It’s the same story, track after track, willfully mistaking alternation for variation, intensification for development and dynamics. In other words, a shining example of pop songcraft in the 21st Century.

hmmmm...

Human After All more than lives up to its name, rendering a metaphor for failure on the grandest yet simultaneously most personal of terms.

nice point, but i don't get the A- as this review seems overly negative too

I don't like the CC album as much as HAA but its still enjoyable but the comparison seems overstated. The albums certainly aren't as close to each other in either sound or method as Deadringer is to The Private Press. And yeah, of course there's a big DP influence in there but the same is true of hundreds of records released over the past few years.

Shadow releases album wih recognisable shtick. Despite subsequently dumping 50% of said shtick inbetween albums to further embrace hardcore hip hop, surf rock, electro and techno, the follow-up resembles less his previous album and more the subsequent work, somehow confusing fans who have settled into a comfort xone of sorts.

Enter RJD2, whose debut album has shades of DJ Shadow's slow burn cross-genre instrumental hip hop, varied moody vs old school rappers-samples and inventive drum programming at times. With this and its general relative safe-playing vs the personal framework exploding/sidestepping and explorations of the rather more energetic second Shadow album, it acquires a large number of old-school Shadow fans who do not immediately spark up a blunt take to their former idol's sophomore effort.

I suggest that the negativity surrounding the current new Daft Punk release could potentially bestow such a similar fortune to the forthcoming wider release of the Cut Copy album, which qualifies for the comparison by being significantly influenced by an older act in the same business (first DP release 1994, first CC release: 1999/2000 - that's for Ronan) and for taking BLATANTLY OBVIOUS influence from a widely known previous album and sound from said act and infusing the end result with its own wider influences and, crucially, an easier to swallow accesibility/pop sensibility.

And any 'indie definition' of Annie that goes beyond her being on an idependent label sounds spurious and wrongheaded to me.

Bye!

Whether the Cut Copy record will benefit from post-HAA disillusionment (Human After All being the Kid A to Cut Copy's Parachutes) it still doesn't change my basic point that the Cut Copy record is coming from a completely different place. They're both great pop records but, with the exception of one or two tracks, BLNL just doesn't feel like a house record to me whereas Discovery clearly does. The indie bit was a windup but it still feels like an indie-dance-pop record influenced by French house. Its all in the drums.

Whereas you could've release Deadringer as a DJ Shadow album and no one would have batted an eyelid.

To me this is like an album of b-sides. The only track that really stands out to me is the title track and the artwork is fucking half-arsed as fuck.
Daft Punk have followed in the steps of their countrymen Air and gone for a simpler sound for their second albums rather than the all-out flamboyance of the second.
I just find it hard to believe that DP are happy with this release and wouldn't be surprised if the rumours about contractual obligation were true. How can the same band who did something as gorgeous and timely as Digital Love be content with something like Brainwasher?
It's not a truly terrible album but I can pretty much tell on first listen that like Talkie Walkie it won't have the staying power of Discovery or 10,000Hz the Legend.

I just wrote this massive thing but then deleted. In short, they've followed similar trajectories from good commercial debut to accomplished and wonderfully proggy follow-up to slightly half-arsed third album.

It's not. It's their ode to Radio-Activity (most of the album is really...I got on this trip when I realized 'Emotion' is basically their take on 'Ohm Sweet Ohm'. Hey 'On/Off', goes for that 'Intermission' spot.)

(You have to wonder with DP if they just toss stuff off or really get all the details right, that tv-set is what at least 30 years old? Like that radio on Radio-Activity was at least 30 years old at the time, etc. etc.)

Uh, dude, the comparisons between Deadringer and Moby's Play are not as facile as they appear (ie, I disagree). And Deadringer is also a lot less fleshy than both Endtroducing and TPP - less ideas too, which certainly makes it the weaker of the 3 for me.

Spencer, a more timely example (ie album cuts) of Cut Copy house is 'That Was Just A Dream', in addition to 'Future', 'Zap Zap' and 'A Dream', which has Crydamoure written all over it.

Hystereo for one, plus they have the harder edge too.

My point really is that, what all of us want surely, from Daft Punk, or any artist, is for them to do something new, something really new and interesting and original.

And the people doing that now are not going to be album orientated acts anyway. It just won't happen. debut albums are what's needed in dance at the moment.

Their first two albums were great, but upon first listen, it seems they have lost it completely third time around. Pity...

I know. But is it? That "All Guitars By Daft Punk" line...I mean: are they stupid/careless (i really don't think so) or do they want to suggest that they didn't sample but replayed that Breakwater riff (noticed how they put it in the liner notes not as 'contains samples of...'?) Suddenly we're deep into Warhol territory (what with all the repitition, the robots, the cries of "I could have made 'Robot Rock'") This album can be read at very different levels, seems almost deliberatly built to generate diverse readings (I'll be surprised if they give any interviews to explain themselves) and we will never know if we're suckers. (aargh bastards, must.stop.now)

yeah, anyone who enjoys HAA needs to check the Le Dust Sucker s/t full-length on Plong. I guarantee you'll like Le Dust Sucker better.

Who's putting out Cut Copy? Anyone?

my friend directed the video for Future - might be a chance that Ill be putting CC out if talks go right

is there any precedent for this? now that the "this can't possibly be daft punk" crutch is gone, how far will DP devotees go to avoid calling a spade a spade?

Looks like a tribute to a tribute, strangely.

*giggles*. The Guardian's review is hilarious.

Well, there's always Metal Machine Music...

Jesus. Stop it already! :) I'm really starting to believe in this performance art reading.

Indie-disco songs with house production and structure. And 'Live' and 'Rendezvous' are sorelly underrated - I listen to 'Live' just as much as 'GC'. Better'n Hystereo too.

Hey I got the Cut Copy promo, I mean fine, you can say that that sound is better at aping old Daft Punk than the latest Daft Punk album, but there are better old Daft Punk copyists too.

That's fascinating, but how many are putting out debut albums this year, this close to HAA no less?

Also, so you're clear, I reiterate that being inspired by Daft Punk is not the entirety of CC's shtick by a long way, but it IS a recognisable part of it. Nowhere did I ever say that Cut Copy made "a good/better Daft Punk album" (though that 50% of DP's pop sensibility that's missing here had ta go somewhere ;-)) and this applies to RJ and Shadow, who are also as divided by difference as they're brought together by similarities (the exact reason RJ supported Shadow on tour, something he told me in an interview was a mild issue for him during 2002, albeit one that ultimately worked in his favour).

And if we break it down purely to my *personal* preferences and comparisons, regardless of which sides of the dance rubik cube these two records spin on, I'll dance to 'Saturdays' 6/10 times over 'Robot Rock' or 'Going Nowhere' over 'HAA', as voted by my feet. Listening's a foregone conclusion, obv.

Haha at Geir up above. That "What's with all this "rock" sounding stuff?" comment is great.

I'd definitely like to think this is in the contractual obligation zone, but it still doesn't make up for some of the lack of engagement. Even Prince did better when we knew he was trying to escape Warners.