Daft Punk's Random Access Memories

xp That blog is crap. Firstly Daft Punk have never denied that they're extremely lucky to have the funds to make an album like this:

"We feel fortunate to be able to experiment on a large scale. There's a lot of experimentation now in alternative music, but it feels like there's no money. The people with the means to be ambitious are usually the ones who are experimenting less."

I don't know how you can begrudge a band for spending $1m of their own money on making a great-sounding record unless you're dumb enough to think that they have contempt for anyone who has to work with less. And this is not a useful simplification: "much of the art that has been the most impactful on me, the most meaningful, has been art that was made by people with limited means." Well good for him. I like the Slits and EPMD but I also like Thriller and Rumours. Let's not fetishise the DIY and read all expensive music as "ha ha fuck the poor". If you look at the pyramid on the 2007 tour and can only think "I wonder how much these privileged bastards spent" instead of "wow, I'm glad they went to so much effort to make this show original and fun" then I feel bad for you.

My biggest problem with the "getting back to real music" stuff is that nothing on RAM touches the songwriting sophistication or melodicism of the artists they're paying sonic tribute to. Which isn't to say the tracks don't work well, but Daft Punk are pretty minimalist as composers, and in a way their use of "real" instruments just makes that stand out to me more and produces a slightly less satisfying result.

― i don't even have an internet (Hurting 2), Thursday, May 30, 2013 8:57 AM (22 minutes ago)

"Touch" dude...

xp That blog is crap.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/05/24/blog_post_vs_blog_this_blog_post_is_not_a_blog.html

I stand corrected. That blog post is crap.

I'm pretty sure the rest of that blog is crap as well.

ugh

deadgirlfriends post is on-point

yeah well i decided this record deserved a dedicated cartridge
http://i.imgur.com/XCvkrXfl.jpg
now it sounds perfect

deadgirlfriend's post reads as if his friends and parents ask him why he didn't make RAM at casual parties. Or that people will now expect him to make a RAM-like album next because RAM exists. So Daft Punk is fucking with his fans' expectations and it's Daft Punk's fault.

It is a mischaracterization of Daft Punk's intentions and fans' expectations.

So I guess his post is on point as a bulletin to his apparently clueless friends

As a critique of RAM, it fails though

seems to me most of the argument against the article is on similar grounds

mischaracterization i mean

i actually loled at how shitty this argument is made:

bloggers dig up all the samples daft punk used on discovery, daft punk goes “fuck you we’re going to hire the dude who played on off the wall”. lcd soundsystem imagines a hypothetical situation where college radio kids use their budget to book daft punk for a concert instead of whatever k records bands they normally would have in the 90’s and makes a song called “daft punk is playing at my house” - daft punk, clad in silk robes and sipping ciroc martinis, react with horror and spend untold amounts of money on a giant pyramid that threatens to overpower even the nation’s largest music festivals, as if to say “no, daft punk is not playing at anyone’s fucking house”

I like the idea that they did it all to spite James Murphy. "Play at someone's house? Non!"

"clad in silk robes and sipping ciroc martinis" This is a next-level truffle fries gambit.

he certainly sets up a lot of straw men and, after noting that their pronouncements are mediated by the media, goes all in on daft punk themselves

lol i like that bit grady

i never thought of the pyramid like that but its a funny way to imagine it

yeah daft punk robots being really snooty like that cristal guy was about rappers liking his champagne

o yeah its hilarious but thats also why its a terrible argument

also, re: strawmen:

http://deadgirlfriends.tumblr.com/post/50704593365/vs

what

Margherita vs. pineapple

mashup

I can see why he prefers Kanye - just a regular dude making beats in his garage and rapping 'bout everyday stuff

the guy would be a good ilm poster someone should get him over here

also he kicks it w/ grimes, vampire weekend, buscemi and debbie harry

http://deadgirlfriends.tumblr.com/post/51139936105/i-forgot-i-guess-i-can-probably-post-this-picture

him and grimes are going out iirc

and dora the explorer

xpost

just a man of the people

i'm a lil weirded out that grimes' boyfriend's twitter is called "dead girlfriends"

twitter tumblr

get it right the first time

damn

my condolences

Writhing at the base of DP's pyramid all 'please sirs. May I have a sample' and then all like 'yo it's me and my boys, vampire weekend'

"it bothers me that sometimes “lo-fi” is perceived as an aesthetic choice rather than an economic reality." sir, the only "economic reality" I see is that your tumblr sucks!

hes an interesting guy, the tumblr is pretty great. i liked this thing he wrote about kanye http://deadgirlfriends.tumblr.com/post/41177837609/this-is-a-picture-of-justin-vernon-from-bon-iver

also elite gymnastics rules imo

the long post that's sort of being discussed is a continuation of this thing too http://deadgirlfriends.tumblr.com/post/50440502642/no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no-fucking-no-this-is-so

feels kind of like he got trolled by bangalter and then this thread got trolled by him

i asked dude i work with who's way in to making music and recording software and "racking up hours in the studio" if he's listened to RAM yet and he just said "yeah..." in a tone of voice that conveyed he knew how much i loved it and he wanted to let me down easy.

i was like "oh, you're not a fan?" and he replied with: "its OK... it's just so... plain."

dude listens to run of the mill drum & bass, "chillout" EDM and indie/punk most of the time afaik

¯\_(°_o)_/¯

The stupider the criticisms of RAM, the more militant my love for it.

i like the album a lot too

i like the album ok but i refuse to accept that it sounds better than any other album just because they told ppl it does + was expensive

xposts to me he seems like good guy who sounds like a dickweed when he talks about daft punk. the ideas he's putting forth about how art & artists should function don't seem very well thought out. his comment about tone REALLY pisses me off.

Will I listen to this as much as I've listened to Homework or Discovery? No way. Is this still a pretty great album? Mmm-yeah, pretty much.

yeah he just needs to be a more careful writer. I blame tumblr

feels kind of like he got trolled by bangalter and then this thread got trolled by him

― max, Thursday, May 30, 2013 3:19 PM (1 minute ago)

i think i can agree with this

I guess trolls are more earnest than they used to be