Daft Punk - Human After All

Didn't the Cut Copy album come out months ago? Why are we talking about Cut Copy again? I think I agree with Matt that outside of a handful of tracks that bear a certain similarity to something DP a bit of, it's got nothing to do with much at all. I think I have lost touch with this thread.

the Cut Copy album is being re-released in May

Good to see your brain's still on somewhat, Steve, "trademark" being the key word. Did Discovery outsell Homework in both albums and singles categories or just get bigger MTV etc rotation (plus using Disco...very to score an animated film would certainly up the trademark some)?

But you lose points for not reading my last but one post where I point out the entire fucking reason for the analogy. And you question why I prefer ILE.

As for Cut Copy, well this is a Human After All thread, so I assumed you'd placed the album in opposition to HAA!

N otm though, there are so so so many Daft Punk copyists, and my point was that this is a thread about "what is wrong with HAA, why is it not a step forward or something Daft Punk should have done", not, at least in my opinion, "why didn't Daft Punk make Discovery again".

I think someone as removed from the scene as Cut Copy can only hope to make a record collection record, whereas the real new Daft Punk sound (and I accept perhaps Barima was not saying this is what Cut Copy are doing), album dance music, is going to come from where Daft Punk originally did, singles dance music.

There's always the strong likelihood of new artists bursting onto the scene in the interim, but I don't think it's crazy to think Black Strobe and Tiefschwarz will eventually do a Vitalic and make a great album, and become the new generation of dance dinosaurs along with him.

(Yeah I know there isn't really a qualitative difference between a Tiefschwarz album and another 12 great remixes but still...)

Why is being dumb, synthentic, repetetive, minimal or anything else suddenly a bad thing when we are talking about dance music anyway? Its like complaining that metal records are too noisy or something.

er, thanks...i think...

I can also easily see OK Cowboy getting a reaction in the vein of, "If you want a 'techno Daft Punk' (impersonating a HYPOTHETICAL reviewer here, or even a disgruntled Discovery-only fan), buy that Vitalic bloke's album**."

Until you said you were having trouble selling HAA, I was pretty confident that this was just a (partly) work-boredom inspired, mildly plausible idea that got twisted into funny shapes by some of you, and now I'm even more interested to see 'Future' reviews of both BLNL and OK C. The only thing missing from certain HAA reviews are comments stating "um, dance not quite at full health yet then". And if HAA's not gonna sell, the 3 most likely beneficiaries (discounting the Jaxx's singles comp due to in-built fanbase and what seem to be decent sales for 'Oh My Gosh' if CD:UK's crowd and my visits to HMV and Tower last night are any indication) would be Vitalic, Cut Copy and/or another frickin' rock band. Oh, and drugs.

**I bought Bangalter's 'Outrage' single before 'Poney EP' b/c I took to it more immediately. It's hard to imagine doing the same today, good as the former is.

I think it's worth noting how long it takes for dance acts to become successful, in this sort of meta discussion, like OK Cowboy may not sell amazingly, but it will do rather well and be critically acclaimed. And it's difficult to see Vitalic just disappearing, I think the same is true of Black Strobe and Tiefschwarz, though they do have a little more to prove as regards what they do with the album format.

x-post perhaps Steve yeah.

That's not good enough. The least that could have been done was to either ask me what I meant specifically or at least know in the first place, as Steve did. I mean, at least show me up by showing me where I directly compare them by genre and style - oh wait.

Oh, and re: "record collection record" - this does not prevent originality from occurring. My favourite record next to Off The Wall IS a record collection record, but it could only have come from that person by dint of what he brought to the table as well. I feel this way about BLNL also.

Less of the eventually please. Both are talented and prolific enough, I want them both to release albums THIS YEAR.

BUT THEY'RE NOT. And another 2 previously named acts are. If HAA does tank but Twarz and Strobe did release this year anyway, they could also potentially be beneficiaries. If not, new year, new mindset.

Why is being dumb, synthentic, repetetive, minimal or anything else suddenly a bad thing when we are talking about dance music anyway? Its like complaining that metal records are too noisy or something.

Well, gee whiz, Matt, what if the sounds aren't interesting enough to warrant sticking out the repetition? The excuse you're making is not good enough for what we're paying!

Well, yes, that's why I've been saying the Vitalic album is better all along because it does the harsh and abraisive thing with so much more force and momentum. But it doesn't mean that HAA is either eclipsed or made redundant because any album containing Human After All, Make Love, Technologic, Emotion and Robot Rock is strong enough in my book.

(I actually like the fact that Emotion is so strung out because it has the sense of space to make that work. Television Rules The Nation is a bigger failure, I think).

Essentially, replace BLNL with OK Cowboy in the analogy, refer to the harsher techno sounds that Vitalic uses and DP are reintroducing to their own work and then imagine that in this hypothetical situation, Vitalic picks up a load more positive press and reactions, if not necessarily more sales, than HAA because some hypothetical writers - or fans - proclaim that he has beaten them at their own game.

It doesn't fit the RJ/Shadow model as easily as HAA and BLNL do but that model has a lot to do with taking the pre-established artist's previous album as the jump-off point. In this loose analogy, Homework would have to be the 2nd DP record or Discovery never happened.

As for the '**'s, I was noting an attendant irony wrt to my own experience where years ago, I was more interested in Bangalter/Daft techno than Vitalic, whereas today, the opposite is certainly true. And here's a precedent, as posted by Matt: From Jess's blog entry: Is it just me or is nearly every track here analogous to another, better track by a lesser known producer from the last few years ("Rocker", "Monstertruckdriver", Vitalic, even stuff on their own labels)

The reason Vitalic has been added to my considerations is also specific to the fact the he's releasing an album, with all this in consideration, this close to HAA. As is Cut Copy etc etc.

But then, I already said a lot of this.

i wonder if Bangalter's still pissed off with so many people stealing his grooves/ideas and having the bigger hit with them when that could be him as it was with Stardust - i don't suppose he's interested in that anymore, and also resigned to the probability that it will continue - and HAA is perhaps in part a reaction to all that too

Well, when this happened to Timbaland, he went off and made Under Construction, Simple Girl and Deliverance. What's DP's excuse?

But it doesn't mean that HAA is either eclipsed or made redundant because any album containing Human After All, Make Love, Technologic, Emotion and Robot Rock is strong enough in my book.

Key words: "my book".

i'm the opposite 'funnily' enough. i just like the ridiculous early 80s metal vibe of 'Television..'

You said it's a Private Press/Deadringer situation, if that's not a comparison by genre and style then nothing is!

And I'm not interested in re-explaining myself again, either. I'd be more patient if you were specific perhaps, but really, I've used my best fine-toothed combs already.

Rex the Dog should release an album.

I'm not sure there's still the same market appeal for a Discovery-esque vocodered pop house album any more than there was still the same market appeal for a Great Escape-esque Britpop album by the time Blur released their eponymous album. Maybe there won't ever be a dance album that hits in the same way as Discovery or Rooty or anything from the 90s ever again. (Until the revival in five years time, hem hem).

(Possible flaw in this argument = Mylo)

Rex the Dog should just release a cartoon DVD, with a few more records, and comedy skits of all the Kompakt artists.

I dunno, I don't think emotionalist maximalism is entirely absent from the current scene, I mean this is exactly what Jacques Lu Cont is exploiting. And a lot of it's about matching up certain production techniques to certain song techniques - there's a lot about what, say, Get Physical are doing, which could easily be folded back into a really open-hearted pop approach. I think as electroclash's specific influence continues to fade the possibility of this happening will become more distinct.

I've been saying this for ages but there so needs to be an electro-house update of The Blue Nile's "Tinseltown in the Rain".

TS - Daft Punk wrongfooting people and throwing off a lot of the people who loved their last album and didn't 'get' the first one vs (brackets mine) [Chemical Brothers making exactly the album everyone in the world expected them to].

I can understand liking Discovery and disliking the new one [snip]

-- Matt DC (runmd...), January 28th, 2005.

Ronan - I still understand where he's coming from but I still think the analogy is a bit skewed. I think where it falls down (aside from the reasons I've already mentioned) is that DJ Shadow was always a relatively specialist concern whereas Discovery was a big mainstream pop success and the mainstream pop landscape has changed a lot in the four intervening years.

Nice try, Matt, but in spite of market differences, Deadringer did not outsell TPP (which also had 2 top 40 hits in the UK - how's that for mainstream? His profile was also a big part in UNKLE's own mainstream experience way back when), I said ages ago that I don't expect BLNL, or OK Cowboy for that matter, to outsell HAA, and furthermore, the public has not lost their taste for catchy, repetitious day-glo dance samples/hooks to the extent that not only did Eric Prydz go to no.1 for an absurdly long time, but 'Waiting For A Star To Fall' has not only been recently reincarnated similarly twice but the second version beat the chart position of the first just this Sunday.

Oh, and your other reasons didn't extend much beyond "Cut Copy are really an indie band" and "I preferred Deadringer".

Tiefschwarz...may not be all that mindblowing. "Blow" and "Issst" were both heavily based on remixes they'd already done (play the remix of Lopazz's "Blood" and "Issst" back to back to see what I mean), they seem to save their new ideas for other people's songs.

Tim - yes, I initially came back in here to say that the electro-house thread posits a summer Tiefschwarz album, which, along with the Black Strobe tidbit, does negate part of my previous rebuttal to Matt. I think you're on to something here.

Then what are you saying?! That lots of people who also bought DJ Shadow records also bought Deadringer because they were in some way dissatisfied with The Private Press, even thought most of them would have bought it anyway because they are really pretty similar things.

His profile was also a big part in UNKLE's own mainstream experience way back when)

Probably not as big as Messrs Yorke and Ashcroft though.

the public has not lost their taste for catchy, repetitious day-glo dance samples/hooks to the extent that not only did Eric Prydz go to no.1 for an absurdly long time, but 'Waiting For A Star To Fall' has not only been recently reincarnated similarly twice but the second version beat the chart position of the first just this Sunday.

I don't disagree with you here, but this IS the weakest singles market ever so all things are relative. I don't think I've heard these 'Waiting For A Star To Fall' things but am I right in thinking they're ripoffs of 'In My Arms' by Mylo, or are they straight disco covers of the original?

I think what I'm essentially getting at is that even if Daft Punk had released Discovery II this week there is no guarantee at all that the record would sell any better than Human After All, let alone Discovery.

I mean most of them would have bought Deadringer anyway.

x-post Matt otm.

You really don't get it, do you? Last time for real:

While still very popular (for it's "niche" etc), TPP was initially harmed by stylistic comparisons to Endtroducing due to its willingness to deliver something more unexpected, COMPARISONS THAT WERE THEN REFLECTED FAVOURABLY, MOSTLY BY FANS, TO THE DEBUT ALBUM THAT WAS RELEASED IN THE SAME TIME-SPAN BY A HITHERTO-MOSTLY UNKNOWN, LIKE-MINDED ARTIST WHO REFLECTED A LOT OF THE STYLISTIC QUALITIES OF THE OTHER ARTIST'S PREVIOUS ALBUM AND THEREBY EXCEEDING THE SALES AND PROFILE EXPECTATIONS FOR DEADRINGER THAN WAS EVEN EXPECTED.

Now, either you get it now or you never will.

Probably not as big as Messrs Yorke and Ashcroft though.

Or the huge marketing campaign, the usual Mo' Wax collectability shenanigans, the touring, the increasing profile of the label and their star find...

I don't disagree with you here, but this IS the weakest singles market ever so all things are relative.

Right, so this - the mainstream pop landscape has changed a lot in the four intervening years - is in fact so relative an occurence it's not a major issue then? Or it is? Which is it? I didn't see 'One More Time' at no.1. And for all the change you're citing, these singles are doing a lot better than 'Plug It In' or 'Stupidisco' (irregardless of quality, overreacters).

I think what I'm essentially getting at is that even if Daft Punk had released Discovery II this week there is no guarantee at all that the record would sell any better than Human After All, let alone Discovery.

Well, Discovery II would by definition contain some enjoyable populist dance tunes. Think that'd help any?

x-p: Ro, the only people making that big a deal out of it are you and Matt, and that comes with your (continuing) cluelessness anyway.

(xpost - I still wuv Barima though)