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Homework is the debut studio album by French electronic music duo Daft Punk , released on 17 January 1997 with Virgin Records . Homework' s success brought worldwide attention to French house music. According to The Village Voice , the album revived house music and departed from the Eurodance formula. The duo produced the tracks without plans to release an album. After working on projects that were intended to be separate singles over five months, they considered the material good enough for an album.

Commercially successful, Homework appeared in 14 national charts, peaking at number 150 on the United States Billboard 200 and at number 37 on the Australian Albums Chart. By February 2001, the album had sold more than two million copies worldwide and received several gold and platinum certifications. Overall Homework received positive critical response. The album features singles that had a significant impact in the French house and global dance music scenes. These include the US Billboard Hot Dance/Club Play number-one singles " Da Funk " and " Around the World ", the latter of which reached number 61 on the Billboard Hot 100.

• 1 Recording history
• 2 Structure
• 3 Track listing
• 4 References

Recording history [ ]

In 1993, Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo presented a demo to Stuart Macmillan of Slam at a rave in EuroDisney. The contents of the cassette eventually saw release on the single " The New Wave ", which was released on April 11, 1994 on Slam's Soma Quality Recordings label. The record also contained the final mix of the track "The New Wave" entitled "Alive".

" Da Funk " and " Rollin' & Scratchin' " were released as a single under the Soma label in 1995. The tracks were then utilized by The Chemical Brothers in DJ sets at The Heavenly Social in London. During the same year, Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons requested that the duo remix their single "Life Is Sweet" and open for The Chemical Brothers' tour in the United Kingdom. The ensuing popularity of Daft Punk's singles led to their signing with Virgin Records in September 1996. Their departure from Soma was noted by Richard Brown of the Glasgow-based label. "We were obviously sad to lose them to Virgin but they had the chance to go big, which they wanted, and it's not very often that a band has that chance after two singles. We're happy for them."

Although Virgin held exclusive distribution rights over Daft Punk’s material, the duo remain the owners of their master recordings through the Daft Trax label. Bangalter expressed that "To be free, we had to be in control. To be in control, we had to finance what we were doing ourselves. The main idea was to be free." [7] Daft Punk discussed their method with Spike Jonze , director of the "Da Funk" music video. He noted that "They were doing everything based on how they wanted to do it. As opposed to, 'oh we got signed to this record company, we gotta use their plan.' They wanted to make sure they never had to do anything that would make them feel bummed on making music." In regards to the duo's creative control and freedom, Bangalter said:

Daft Punk worked to record other tracks, including " Revolution 909 " and " Around the World ". The album was mixed and recorded in their own studio, Daft House in Paris , France. It was mastered by Nilesh Patel at the London studio The Exchange.

Virgin re-released "Da Funk" with the B-side " Musique " in 1996, before the debut of Homework . Bangalter later stated that the B-side "was never intended to be on the album, and in fact, 'Da Funk' as a single has sold more units than Homework , so more people own it anyways than they would if it had been on the album. It is basically used to make the single a double-feature."

Structure [ ]

Daft Punk produced the tracks included in Homework without a plan to release an album. Bangalter stated, "It was supposed to be just 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." [1] The duo set the order of the tracks to cover the four sides of a two-disc vinyl LP. [2] De Homem-Christo remarked, "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." [2] The name Homework , Bangalter explained, relates to "the fact that we made the record at home, very cheaply, very quickly, and spontaneously, trying to do cool stuff." [3]

"Daftendirekt" is an excerpt of a live performance recorded at the first I Love Techno party in Ghent, Belgium. [4] It served as the introduction to Daft Punk's live shows and was used to begin the album. [2] Janet Jackson sampled "Daftendirekt" on her song "So Much Betta", which was included in her tenth studio album, Discipline , in 2008. [5] Homework' s following track, "WDPK 83.7 FM", is a tribute to FM radio in the US. [6] The next song, " Revolution 909 " is a reflection on the French government's stance on dance music. [2] [7]

"Revolution 909" is followed by " Da Funk ", which carries elements of funk and acid music. [8] According to Andrew Asch of the Boca Raton News , the song's composition "relies on a bouncy funk guitar to communicate its message of dumb fun." [9] Bangalter expressed that "Da Funk"'s theme involved the introduction of a simple, unusual element that becomes acceptable and moving over time. [10] Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine complimented the song as "unrelenting", [11] and Bob Gajarsky of Westnet called it "a beautiful meeting of Chic (circa "Good Times", sans vocals) and the 90s form of electronica." [12] The song appeared on the soundtrack for the 1997 film The Saint and was placed at number 18 on Pitchfork Media's "Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s" list. [13] "Phoenix" combines elements of gospel music and house music. [2] The duo considered "Fresh" to be breezy and light with a comical structure. [14] Ian Mathers of Stylus Magazine criticized the song, stating that it "doesn’t feel like the beach just because of the lapping waves heard in the background." [15]

The single " Around the World " carries influences of Gershon Kingsley 's hit "Popcorn". [8] Its music video was directed by the Academy Award-winning French filmmaker Michel Gondry, who compared the track's bassline to that of "Good Times" by Chic. [16] Chris Power of BBC Music named it "one of the decade’s catchiest singles". He stated that it was "a perfect example of Daft Punk’s sound at its most accessible: a post-disco boogie bassline, a minimalist sprinkling of synthetic keyboard melody and a single, naggingly insistent hook." [17] Ian Mathers of Stylus Magazine commented that "there is no way you’d want to have a Homework without 'Around The World'." [15] The track "Teachers" is a tribute to several of Daft Punk's house music influences, including future collaborators Romanthony , DJ Sneak and Todd Edwards . [18] The song "Oh Yeah" features DJ Deelat and DJ Crabbe. "Indo Silver Club" features a sample of "Hot Shot" by Karen Young . [4] Prior to its inclusion on Homework , "Indo Silver Club" was released as a single on the Soma Quality Recordings label in two parts. [19] The single lacked an artist credit in the packaging [19] and was thought to have been created by the nonexistent producers Indo Silver Club. [20] The final track, "Funk Ad", is a reversed clip of "Da Funk". [2]

Track listing

References [ ].

• ↑ James (2003), p. 269.
• ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 Warner, Jennifer. "Interview with Daft Punk" . p. 3. DMA . About.com . Retrieved on 30 March 2007.
• ↑ Nickson, Chris (June 1997) Daft Punk: Parlez-vous da funk? . CMJ New Music Monthly (46) (CMJ Network) p. 10. ISSN 1074-6978 . Retrieved 31 January 2013.
• ↑ 4.0 4.1 Homework ( liner notes ). Daft Punk . Virgin Records , a division of EMI Group . 42609. 1997.
• ↑ Discipline (Booklet). Janet Jackson . Island Records , a division of [[wikipedia:The Island Def Jam Music Group]|The Island Def Jam Music Group]]. 2008.
• ↑ Di Perna, Alan (April 2001). "We Are The Robots", Pulse! . pp. 65–69.
• ↑ Warner, Jennifer. "Interview with Daft Punk" . p. 2. DMA . About.com . Retrieved on 10 February 2012.
• ↑ 8.0 8.1 Collin, Matthew (August 1997). "Do You Think You Can Hide From Stardom?" . Mixmag . Retrieved on 6 March 2007.
• ↑ Asch, Andrew (18 December 1997). "Daft Punk smashes charts with simplicity" . Boca Raton News . Retrieved on 1 May 2012.
• ↑ Daft Punk audio commentary for "Da Funk" music video , The Work of Director Spike Jonze (2003).
• ↑ Cinquemani, Sal (2 November 2002). "Daft Punk – Homework" . Slant Magazine . Retrieved on 1 May 2012.
• ↑ Gajarsky, Bob (28 April 1997). "Daft Punk, Homework" . Westnet. Retrieved on 1 May 2012.
• ↑ Ryan Dombal (3 September 2009). "Staff Lists: The Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s: 20-01" . Pitchfork Media . Retrieved on 10 February 2012.
• ↑ D.A.F.T.: A Story About Dogs, Androids, Firemen and Tomatoes . Virgin Records. 1999.
• ↑ 15.0 15.1 Mathers, Ian (9 May 2005). "Daft Punk: Homework – Playing God" . Stylus Magazine . Retrieved on 1 May 2012.
• ↑ Gondry, Michel (2003). The Work of Director Michel Gondry companion book. Palm Pictures . Retrieved on 4 May 2012.
• ↑ Power, Chris (5 January 2010). "Review of Daft Punk – Homework" . BBC Music . British Broadcasting Corporation . Retrieved on 1 May 2012.
• ↑ Gill, Chris (1 May 2001). ROBOPOP . Remix Magazine . Archived from the original on 11 February 2012. Retrieved 18 February 2012.
• ↑ 19.0 19.1 Indo Silver Club (liner notes). Daft Punk. Soma Quality Recordings. SOMA 035.
• ↑ Silcott, Mireille (3 April 1997). "Personality punks" . Montreal Mirror . Archived from the original on 6 June 2011. Retrieved on 3 August 2011.
• 1 Veridis Quo
• 2 Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem
• 3 Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo

Homework (Daft Punk album)

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Homework  is the debut  studio album  by French  electronic music  duo  Daft Punk , released in January 1997 on  Virgin Records .  Homework ' s success brought worldwide attention to  French house  music. According to  The Village Voice , the album revived house music and departed from the  Eurodance  formula. The duo produced the tracks without plans to release an album. After working on projects that were intended to be separate singles over five months, they considered the material good enough for an album.

Homework  charted in 14 different countries, peaking at number 3 on the French Albums Chart, number 150 on the United States  Billboard  200  and at number 8 on the  UK Albums Chart . By February 2001, the album had sold more than two million copies worldwide and received several  gold  and  platinum  certifications. Overall,  Homework  received positive critical response. The album features singles that had significant impact in the French house and global dance music scenes, including the U.S.  Billboard   Hot Dance/Club Play  number-one singles " Da Funk " and " Around the World ", the latter of which reached number 61 on the Billboard  Hot 100 .

• 2 Recording history [ edit ]
• 3 Structure [ edit ]
• 4 Singles [ edit ]
• 5 Commercial performance [ edit ]
• 6 Critical reception [ edit ]
• 7 Track listing [ edit ]
• 8 Charts [ edit ]
• 9 Certifications [ edit ]

Contents [ ]

 [ hide ]  * 1 Recording history

• 2 Structure
• 3 Singles
• 4 Commercial performance
• 5 Critical reception
• 6 Track listing
• 7 Charts
• 8 Certifications
• 9 References
• 10 Bibliography
• 11 External links

Recording history [ edit ] [ ]

In 1993,  Thomas Bangalter  and  Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo  presented a demo of their  electronic music  to  DJ  Stuart Macmillan at a  rave  at  EuroDisney . [1 ] The contents of the cassette were released on the single " The New Wave " on 11 April 1994, by  Soma Quality Recordings , a Scottish techno and house label co-founded in 1991 by MacMillan's band  Slam . [2 ]  Daft Punk returned to the studio in May 1995 to record "Da Funk", [3 ]  which was released later that year alongside "Rollin' & Scratchin'" under the Soma label. [4 ]

We've got much more control than money. You can't get everything. We live in a society where money is what people want, so they can't get the control. We chose. Control is freedom. People say we're control freaks, but control is controlling your destiny without controlling other people.

The increasing popularity of Daft Punk's singles led to a bidding war among  record labels , resulting in the duo's signing to  Virgin Records  in 1996. [6 ] [7 ]  Their departure was noted by Richard Brown of Soma, who affirmed that "we were obviously sad to lose them to Virgin but they had the chance to go big, which they wanted, and it's not very often that a band has that chance after two singles. We're happy for them." [1 ] Virgin re-released "Da Funk" with the B-side " Musique " in 1996, a year before releasing  Homework . Bangalter later stated that the B-side "was never intended to be on the album, and in fact, 'Da Funk' as a single has sold more units than  Homework , so more people own it anyways [ sic ] than they would if it had been on the album. It is basically used to make the single a double-feature." [8 ]  The album was mixed and recorded in Daft Punk's studio, Daft House in Paris. It was  mastered  by Nilesh Patel at the London studio The Exchange. [9 ]

Bangalter stated that "to be free, we had to be in control. To be in control, we had to finance what we were doing ourselves. The main idea was to be free." [10 ]  Daft Punk discussed their method with  Spike Jonze , director of the "Da Funk" music video. He noted that "they were doing everything based on how they wanted to do it. As opposed to, 'oh we got signed to this record company, we gotta use their plan.' They wanted to make sure they never had to do anything that would make them feel bummed on making music." [11 ]  Although Virgin Records holds exclusive distribution rights over Daft Punk's material, the duo still owns their master recordings through their Daft Trax label. [6 ] [12 ]

Structure [ edit ] [ ]

Daft Punk produced the tracks included in  Homework  without a plan to release an album. Bangalter stated, "It was supposed to be just 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." [13 ]  The duo set the order of the tracks to cover the four sides of a two-disc  vinyl LP . [8 ]  De Homem-Christo remarked, "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." [8 ]  The name  Homework , Bangalter explained, relates to "the fact that we made the record at home, very cheaply, very quickly, and spontaneously, trying to do cool stuff." [14 ]

"Daftendirekt" is an excerpt of a live performance recorded in  Ghent, Belgium ; [9 ]  it served as the introduction to Daft Punk's live shows and was used to begin the album. [8 ]  The performance took place at the first  I Love Techno , an event co-produced by Fuse and On the Rox on 10 November 1995. [17 ] Janet Jackson  sampled "Daftendirekt" on her song "So Much Betta", which was included in her tenth studio album,  Discipline , in 2008. [18 ]   Homework' s following track, "WDPK 83.7 FM", is a tribute to  FM  radio in the US. [10 ]  The next song, " Revolution 909 " is a reflection on the French government's stance on dance music. [8 ] [19 ]

"Revolution 909" is followed by " Da Funk ", which carries elements of funk and acid music. [1 ]  According to Andrew Asch of the  Boca Raton News , the song's composition "relies on a bouncy funk guitar to communicate its message of dumb fun." [20 ]  Bangalter expressed that "Da Funk"'s theme involved the introduction of a simple, unusual element that becomes acceptable and moving over time. [21 ]  Sal Cinquemani of  Slant Magazine  complimented the song as "unrelenting", [22 ]  and Bob Gajarsky of  Westnet  called it "a beautiful meeting of  Chic  (circa " Good Times ", sans vocals) and the 90s form of electronica ." [23 ]  The song appeared on the  soundtrack  for the 1997 film  The Saint  and was placed at number 18 on Pitchfork Media's "Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s" list. [24 ]  "Phœnix" combines elements of  gospel music  and house music. [8 ]  The duo considered "Fresh" to be breezy and light with a comical structure. [25 ]  Ian Mathers of Stylus Magazine criticized the song, stating that it "doesn't feel like the beach just because of the lapping waves heard in the background." [26 ]

The single " Around the World " carries influences of  Gershon Kingsley 's hit " Popcorn ". [1 ]  Its music video was directed by the  Academy Award -winning French filmmaker  Michel Gondry , who compared the track's  bassline  to that of "Good Times" by Chic. [27 ]  Chris Power of  BBC Music  named it "one of the decade's catchiest singles". He stated that it was "a perfect example of Daft Punk's sound at its most accessible: a post-disco  boogie  bassline, a minimalist sprinkling of synthetic keyboard melody and a single, naggingly insistent hook." [16 ]  Ian Mathers of Stylus Magazine commented that "there is no way you'd want to have a  Homework  without 'Around The World'." [26 ]  The track "Teachers" is a tribute to several of Daft Punk's house music influences, including future collaborators  Romanthony ,  DJ Sneak  and Todd Edwards . [28 ]  The song "Oh Yeah" features DJ Deelat and DJ Crabbe. "Indo Silver Club" features a sample of " Hot Shot " by  Karen Young . [9 ]  Prior to its inclusion on  Homework , "Indo Silver Club" was released as a single on the Soma Quality Recordings label in two parts. [29 ]  The single lacked an artist credit in the packaging [29 ]  and was thought to have been created by the nonexistent producers Indo Silver Club. [30 ]  The final track, "Funk Ad", is a reversed clip of "Da Funk". [8 ]

Singles [ edit ] [ ]

Homework  features singles that had significant impact in the  French house [31 ]  and global dance music scenes. [6 ]  The first single from the album, "Alive", was included as a B-side on the single "The New Wave", which was released in April 1994. The album's second single was "Da Funk"; it was initially released in 1995 by Soma and was re-released by Virgin Records in 1996. It became the duo's first number-one single on the  Billboard   Hot Dance/Club Play  chart. [32 ]  The song reached number seven on British [33 ]  and French charts. [34 ]  The third single, "Around the World", was a critical and commercial success, becoming the second number-one single on the  Billboard  Hot Dance/Club Play chart, [32 ]  as well as reaching number 11 in Australia, [35 ]  number five in the United Kingdom [36 ]  and number 61 on the Billboard  Hot 100 . [37 ]  In October 2011,  NME  placed "Around the World" at number 21 on its list of "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years". [38 ]  The album's fourth single was " Burnin' "; it was released in September 1997 and peaked at number 30 in the UK. [36 ]  The final single from  Homework  was "Revolution 909". It was released in February 1998 and reached number 47 in the UK [36 ]  and number 12 on the Billboard  Hot Dance/Club Play chart. [37 ]

In 1999, the duo released a video collection featuring music videos of tracks and singles from the album under the name of  D.A.F.T.: A Story About Dogs, Androids, Firemen and Tomatoes . Although its title derives from the appearances of dogs ("Da Funk" and "Fresh"), androids ("Around the World"), firemen ("Burnin'"), and tomatoes ("Revolution 909") in the videos, a cohesive plot does not connect its episodes. [39 ]

Commercial performance [ edit ] [ ]

Daft Punk wanted the majority of pressings to be on vinyl, so only 50,000 albums were initially printed in CD format. After its release, overwhelming sales of  Homework  caused distributors to accelerate production to satisfy demand. The album was distributed in 35 countries worldwide, [6 ]  peaking at number 150 on the  Billboard  200 . [40 ]   Homework  first charted on the  Australian Albums Chart  on 27 April 1997; it remained there for eight weeks and peaked at number 37. [41 ]  In France, the album reached number three and stayed on the chart for 82 weeks. In 1999, it reached Gold status in France for selling more than 100,000 copies. [42 ]  On 11 July 2001, the album was  certified Gold  by the  Recording Industry Association of America , indicating sales of 500,000 copies in the US. [43 ] [44 ]  By October 1997, the album had sold 220,000 copies worldwide, [45 ]  although  Billboard  reported that, according to Virgin Records, two million copies have been sold by February 2001. [46 ]  By September 2007, 605,000 copies have been sold in the United States. [47 ]

Critical reception [ edit ] [ ]

Homework ' s success brought worldwide attention to French  progressive house  music, [57 ]  and drew attention to French house music. [31 ]  According to  The Village Voice , the album revived house music and departed from the  Euro  dance formula. [58 ]  In the book  1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die , critic Alex Rayner stated that  Homework  tied the established club styles to the "burgeoning eclecticism" of  big beat . He contended that it served as a proof that "there was more to dance music than pills and keyboard presets." [59 ]  The website Clashmusic described  Homework  as an entry point of accessibility for a "burgeoning movement on the cusp of splitting the mainstream seam." [60 ]

In 2009, Brian Linder of  IGN  described  Homework  as the duo's third-best album. He catalogued as a "groundbreaking achievement" the way they used their unique skills to craft the house, techno, acid and punk music styles into the record. [61 ]  Hua Hsu of  eMusic  agreed, applauding  Homework  for how it captured a "feeling of discovery and exploration" as a result of "years of careful study of the finest house, techno, electro and hip-hop records." [50 ]  David Browne, writing in Entertainment Weekly , stated that the duo knew how to use "their playful, hip-hopping ambient techno" to craft the album. He named  Homework  the "ideal disco for androids". [52 ]  Sean Cooper of  Allmusic  called the album "an almost certain classic" and "essential". [48 ]

Chris Power of  BBC Music  compared  Homework ' s "less-is-more" approach to  compression 's use as "a sonic tribute" to the  FM   radio stations  that "fed Daft Punk's youthful obsessions." [16 ]  Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine wrote that "while a few tracks are more daft than deft," more recent groundbreakers like The Avalanches  could never exist without "Da Funk". [22 ]  Ian Mathers of  Stylus Magazine  noted that "there's a core of unimpeachably classic work on Homework , hidden among the merely good, and when you've got such a classic debut hidden in the outlines of the epic slouch of their debut, it's hard not to get frustrated." [26 ]   Rolling Stone  awarded the album three stars out of five, commenting that "the duo's essential, career-defining insight is that the problem with disco the first time around was not that it was stupid but that it was not stupid enough." [55 ] Rolling Stone  ranked  Homework  at the top on their list of "The 30 Greatest EDM Albums of All Time" while affirming that Daft Punk's debut "is pure synapse-tweaking brilliance." [55 ]

According to Scott Woods of  The Village Voice , "Daft Punk [tore] the lid off the [creative] sewer" with the release of  Homework . [58 ]  Ryan Schreiber of Pitchfork Media awarded it 7.6 out of 10. He stated that " Homework  provides sixteen whole tracks of modern-day boom box bass n' drum and unlike your science project, it doesn't require a lot of intricate calculations to figure out how it works." In his view, "It sounds like an  Atari 2600  on a killing spree." [53 ]  By contrast,  Robert Christgau  of  The Village Voice  cited "Da Funk" as a "choice cut", [49 ]  indicating "a good song on an album that isn't worth your time or money". [62 ]  Darren Gawle from  Drop-D Magazine  also gave a negative review, stating that " Homework  is the work of a couple of DJs who sound amateurish at best." [63 ]

Track listing [ edit ] [ ]

All music composed by  Thomas Bangalter  and  Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo .

Charts [ edit ] [ ]

Certifications [ edit ] [ ].

• 1 Ayesha Erotica
• 2 Melanie Martinez
• 3 Taylor Swift (album)

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By Ryan Dombal

Photos by Nabil

Daft Punk are standing on a helipad overlooking downtown Los Angeles as fireballs make their sequined suits glisten with hot heat. It's a few days before this year's Coachella, where the duo's shiny new duds will premiere by way of a Jumbotron trailer for their new album, Random Access Memories . But for now, only a very select few have laid eyes on the outfits-- and everyone involved in today's photo shoot desperately wants to keep it that way.

This task proves to be somewhat difficult. The helipad is inside a public park, and there's a pedestrian path right next to it. Errant runners and bikers are all but inevitable, and if one of them decides to whip their phone out, snap a photo, and upload it to Instagram without breaking stride, this important piece of Daft Punk's meticulous rollout strategy will be ruined.

For the first part of the day's shoot, Thomas Bangalter (silver helmet) and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo (gold helmet) stand behind a wall of eight-foot flames. Members of the crew, some of whom wear white gloves in order to avoid smudges on the pair's glittering getups, remain vigilant for curious passersby. And as the fireball sequence begins, a guy is seen creeping up from a clearing off to the side of the helipad. He sits in the grass close by, shakily opens his backpack, and takes a sip from a water bottle. "Is that them?" he asks, brandishing his phone.

DJ Falcon, longtime friend of Daft Punk and one of many collaborators on the new album, rushes over. "The guy was in a trance," recalls Falcon a couple of days later. "It's like he was thinking, 'That's the picture of my life-- I'm going to be the one who shows the world.' I could feel the intensity." So as the trembling fan tries to get his shot, Falcon sticks his arms up to block him, "like an NBA defender." A park monitor notices the hubbub and screams, "Assault! Permit revoked! Shut it down!" Daft Punk retreat to their trailer. No more fireballs.

Eventually, the drama dies down enough for everyone to review the would-be paparazzo's camera phone footage. "It was just a video of me trying to protect my friends-- jumping in front of the bullet," says Falcon. "You couldn't see shit."

Zoom out for a second, and this entire scene can seem deeply silly: a group of adults frantically trying to hide the image of two Frenchmen in their late 30s wearing costumes that make them look like C-3PO after a well-tailored disco makeover. But once you spend any time with Daft Punk-- or even just listen to their music, or watch their videos, or gawk at their live show-- such protectiveness suddenly becomes understandable, even necessary. It's an instinct to keep the idea of mystery alive at a time when it seems to be in historically short supply.

The day after the pair's refurbished guises were revealed on Coachella's screens as planned-- causing mad dashes and some of the festival's most excited outbursts-- Bangalter says everything about RAM and its buildup is about the surprise, the magic. "When you know how a magic trick is done, it's so depressing," he explains. "We focus on the illusion because giving away how it's done instantly shuts down the sense of excitement and innocence."

This strategy extends to the album's daunting and ambitious conception, which had Daft Punk recruiting some of the world's most gifted session players-- guys who worked on classics by the likes of Michael Jackson, Madonna, and David Bowie-- to lay down the beats, melodies, and chords bouncing around Bangalter and de Homem-Christo's heads. Not to mention full-on, mind-melding collaborations with a number of their idols and like-minded contemporaries including Chic mastermind Nile Rodgers, Pharrell, schmaltzy 70s singer/songwriter Paul Williams, Panda Bear, house deity Todd Edwards, and electro originator Giorgio Moroder. Plus: Everything was recorded onto analog tape in rarified recording palaces like New York's Electric Lady and L.A.'s Capitol Studios. Human spontaneity was coveted; computers, with their tendency toward mindless repetition, were not.

"Technology has made music accessible in a philosophically interesting way, which is great," says Bangalter, talking about the proliferation of home recording and the laptop studio. "But on the other hand, when everybody has the ability to make magic, it's like there's no more magic-- if the audience can just do it themselves, why are they going to bother?"

On the edge of the San Jacinto Mountains in Rancho Mirage, California-- somewhere between Frank Sinatra Dr. and a sunstruck Bentley dealership-- is the Bing Crosby Estate, where Daft Punk are staying while in town for this year's Coachella. The house's name is not a misnomer: The famed crooner had it built in 1957, as he eased into his golden years. Now, anyone with a healthy bank account can enjoy the saltwater pool, valley-wide view, and old-school-celebrity aura-- JFK and Marilyn Monroe supposedly had a fling here in the early 60s-- for just $3,000 a night.

About a dozen friends relax in and around the pool while Jay-Z, Janet Jackson, and Miguel flow from the stereo at a very reasonable volume. Bangalter and de Homem-Christo sit near the fringe of the backyard patio, mountain winds gusting down alongside the single-story abode. Considering their typical full-body attire, it's a bit shocking to see Daft Punk simply lounging in swim trunks.

Bangalter is tall, slim, and bearded in an unbuttoned denim top and straw hat. He does a solid 95 percent of the talking, and while he claims to not know English that well at one point, he probably has a more extensive vocabulary than many Americans. He sometimes takes long pauses-- 10 seconds or more-- before answering a question, but those responses can go on, uninterrupted, for minutes, often peppered with thoughtful stammers. The 38-year-old comes off as quite serious and careful, not interested in pleasantries. He just wants to articulate the ideas and concepts rattling around his big brain; with a reporter and a recorder in front of him, he's well aware of the transaction taking place.

De Homem-Christo, 39, is shirtless with a small gold wishbone hanging from his neck, a sturdy gold band around his wrist, and a gold-cased iPhone on a nearby chair; with his flowing shoulder-length dark hair, he kind of looks like a shorter, wider, French-er Johnny Depp. During the rare instances when he does speak, he's spacier and less guarded. A couple of times, he sums up a two-minute Bangalter soliloquy with a quick, to-the-point sentence or phrase. During our three-hour conversation, there's little interaction between the two, who have been friends for 26 years, but no trace of hostility either. Even with their helmets off, these two give off an even-keeled, low-humming sense of artful efficiency.

"Technology has made music accessible in a philosophically interesting way, but when everybody has the ability to make magic, it's like there's no more magic." -- Thomas Bangalter

About 15 miles away is the Empire Polo Field, where Daft Punk debuted their epochal pyramid show at Coachella in 2006. At that point, the duo hadn't toured since the release of their first album, Homework , in 1997. For those early gigs, they would stand motionless, mixing their own repetitive, intoxicating dance tracks with house classics in front of maybe 2,000 people, tops. "The minimalist music has appealingly peculiar personality; the duo doesn't," chided a live review in Spin at the time. And while they wore an array of masks for photo shoots during the Homework era, they unveiled their robot selves for 2001's Discovery -- but didn't tour at all behind that album. The dreary and monotonous Human After All followed in 2005, causing even the most devout fans to question the duo's motives. But thanks to curiosity, along with the slowly growing cult adoration of Discovery 's genre-obliterating genius*,* tens of thousands turned up to their desert set seven years ago. Bangalter remembers being driven to the stage in a golf cart in full robot regalia and hearing the chants: "Daft Punk! Daft Punk!"

"To jump from 1,800 people to 40,000 was pretty brutal ," he says, stretching out the word. "Because of the anonymity, the relationship with our audience until that point was an abstract concept, so to feel this energy was very strange. It felt like we had validated something that had been so abstract-- in French, it's called le concrétisation ..."

De Homem-Christo offers a translation: "Make it real."

"We like the idea of trying to be pioneers," continues Bangalter, "but the problem with that is when you're too much ahead, the connection doesn't really happen at the time. At Coachella, we still may have been five years ahead of people, but the connection was happening at that moment . It was the most synched-up we ever felt."

The glowing pyramid became Daft Punk's calling card as it traveled around the world for 18 months, earning its place as one of the most joyful spectacles in pop music history and paving the way for wider acceptance of dance culture, especially in the States. Skrillex, whose blinding live setup has arguably come closest to matching the pyramid's legacy over the last few years, recalls going to see Daft Punk by himself in 2007, buying a ticket from a scalper for $170, and having his mind rearranged-- without the influence of drugs or alcohol. "It was definitely that show for me," he says. Panda Bear has called it the best concert he's ever seen. As the tour's official photographer, DJ Falcon got to experience around 40 shows from an enviable viewpoint. He remembers one in particular, at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado: "There were all these handicapped people with their families in the front, and they were so happy ," he says, a trace of awe in his voice. "At some point, I was wondering if they were going to stand up and start walking, like a miracle!"

With demand still extremely high, Daft Punk put an end to the trek as 2007 drew to a close. "We wanted to seal it as a special moment," says Bangalter. But would they ever bring the pyramid back? Bangalter considers the question for a moment, flicking a fly away from his nose. "We never want to do something twice... but at the same time, we've never done anything twice, so if we did do something twice, that might be cool." He chuckles at his own circuitous logic; de Homem-Christo lets out a weary groan, sensing a slippery slope. Despite the truckloads of cash that would surely greet them if they were to slip into their sparkling duds and sit atop a giant cube or sphere, they say there are no immediate plans for a new tour of any kind.

The pyramid blowout was akin to your typical rock star extravaganza in scale and scope, but also laced with the more inclusive and diffusive aspects of traditional DJ gigs, where everyone's the star. It put Daft Punk in a unique position within contemporary music's personality-driven ecosystem: legitimately famous and faceless. To this point, Bangalter compares their situation to Batman ("we feel that the pyramid was like our Batmobile"), Cinderella ("after the show is over, we go back to anonymity and normality"), the Wizard of Oz ("we're just guys behind a curtain pushing the knobs and creating the spectacle"), and a dude in a Mickey Mouse costume at Disney World ("if you have 100 kids around you all day long, are you not becoming big-headed?"). Their mechanized identities also act as a buffer for the out-of-control egomania that could result from a sea of people losing their shit in your general direction as you stand over them from the apex of a million-watt triangle.

"Looking at robots is not like looking at an idol," contends de Homem-Christo. "It's not a human being, so it's more like a mirror-- the energy people send to the stage bounces back and everybody has a good time together rather than focusing on us." Also, it turns out those helmets make it pretty hard to, you know, see . "The visors are very, very tinted, and I'm shortsighted, anyway," says Bangalter. "I could hear the clamor, but I have hardly any visual memory of the tour aside from looking at our controllers."

Just as their costumes put up a physical boundary between themselves and their audience, Daft Punk enjoy a "total separation" between their private and public lives, which is precisely what they want. "We don't talk about our private lives because they're private," says Bangalter with a laugh. "Plus, the public image is more fun and entertaining anyway." Instead of desiring traditional fame and worldwide recognition, Bangalter says they're more interested in "changing the world without anybody knowing who we are, which is a very different ego fantasy, and it seems to be the premise for much more exciting developments."

"Usually, the 24-hour, high-maintenance celebrity lifestyle can disconnect people from reality," he continues. "And after a band has been making records for 20 years, they're not doing the most interesting shit because they fall into this bourgeois, successful, settled existence."

Even from an early age, both Bangalter and de Homem-Christo went out of their way to distance themselves from the comforts of normalcy. In fact, they may have never met if Bangalter's music-producer father (who wrote several 70s disco hits) and ballet-dancer mother didn't transfer him into Paris' prestigious Lycée Carnot high school, looking to give their son more of a challenge after he easily vaulted to the top of his class elsewhere. While both grew up with money-- de Homem-Christo's family ran an ad agency-- their parents allowed them a sense of freedom, which was hardly a given among their buttoned-up classmates.

"Even when those kids were 13, social-class weight was already on them," says de Homem-Christo. "They were dressed like their fathers, it was crazy." Bangalter recalls a well-behaved teenage acquaintance who wished to be an accountant because he could "have a cool retirement plan." The pair, who were among only a few in their school who were into the likes of Spacemen 3, My Bloody Valentine, Primal Scream, Big Star, the Beach Boys, and the Velvet Underground, quickly bonded. And, in their own way, they've been bucking the status quo ever since. It's why Daft Punk are more punk than almost any punk band of the last 20 years: They refuse to take the familiar path, all in the name of keeping themselves-- and their audience-- engaged. Random Access Memories , their first proper album in eight years, takes this impulse to the extreme.

The record also marks something of full-circle moment for the disco movement of the 70s, which began as an open-minded, underground scene, became entangled and homogenized by the corporate music industry, and then promptly crashed. Without major money backing it, disco couldn't afford the studio time and virtuoso players that produced some of its greatest hits, but its progressive spirit lived on through several scrappy electronic strains of the 80s, including house, techno, and hip-hop-- the same sounds that originally inspired Daft Punk on Homework .

As true house disciples, the duo have never been shy about their influences. From Homework 's "Teachers", a shout-out track in which they literally lists their heroes, to the many samples and interpolations that make up Discovery , they're often at their best while joyously interacting with the past. And RAM , which shuttles between celebratory disco, moody funk, expansive psychedelia, new wave pop, G-funk, and even minimalist trap music, has the same sort of eclectic reach that would be found at legendary clubs like New York's Paradise Garage, where a normal night could include songs by James Brown, the Police, Steve Miller Band, Talking Heads, and Kraftwerk. To Daft Punk, the album is something of a corrective to a style of music that they believe is caught in a computer-addled rut.

"It's very strange how electronic music formatted itself and forgot that its roots are about freedom and the acceptance of every race, gender, and style of music into this big party," says Bangalter. "Instead, it started to become this electronic lifestyle which also involved the glorification of technology."

To be clear: Daft Punk are not anti-technology, or even anti-computer (they readily admit that RAM could not have been made without them). But they do have a certain amount of ire for the normalizing aspect technology can have upon music, how lines of code are unable to recreate the variables that sprout from relatively organic techniques.

"We were never able to connect with using computers as musical instruments," Bangalter shrugs. "We've always relied on hardware components-- old drum machines, synthesizers-- but it was more like a chaotic electrical lab with wires everywhere. We tried to make music with laptops in the mid 2000s, but it was really hard to create from within the computer without putting things into it. In a computer, everything is recallable all the time, but life is a succession of events that only happen once."

Daft Punk started working on Random Access Memories in 2008, playing almost everything on their own and making loops, just like they had done before. But it didn't feel right. "It became clear that we were limited by our own disability to hold a groove the way we wanted for more than eight or 16 bars," admits Bangalter. "Something we love about disco is the idea of playing the same groove over and over again-- your brain can tell it's not a sample that's being replayed."

So they enlisted technically masterful instrumentalists (the kind of guys who grace the covers of magazines like Modern Drummer and Bass Musician ), put different combinations of players together, explained their ideas, laid down sheet music or hummed melodies, and collected tons of original recordings on analog tape. "The idea of working with musicians was way beyond making it sound better," says Bangalter. "It was an opportunity to create something on a very personal level with people that we admire the most."

To that end, they would often meet with these collaborators beforehand to talk about the ideas and inspirations behind the album before even stepping inside of a studio. Chic's Nile Rodgers, the hitmaking funk Zelig behind some of the slickest guitar licks of all-time, recalls breaking out his old-fashioned L5 jazz guitar in his living room during his first meeting with Bangalter and de Homem-Christo last year. "They just got all hyped," he says. The three ended up recording Rodgers' parts over the course of a few days at Manhattan's Electric Lady Studios, the same spot where Chic laid down their first single in 1977. Along with his guitar playing, Rodgers showed Daft Punk some of his trademark recording methods, too. "That's how you did it in the old days-- when a person is paying you top dollar, you want to make sure that they're happy and they don't have to call you back," says Rodgers, laughing. "So I just bombarded them with ideas and said, 'OK, now you guys figure that shit out.'"

Indeed, deciding how to arrange what Bangalter calls "an overwhelming amount of assets" was the most difficult part of putting RAM together, and why it took so long. For instance, even though they recorded orchestra parts for nearly every song on the album, those strings only ended up on three or four tracks. Even a seemingly straightforward tune like first single "Get Lucky" took about 18 months from start to finish, as it slowly mutated from a Wurlitzer-based track to the chugging summer anthem we now know. The album's title, which was settled early on, became a guidepost and a justification for the record's whiplash jump cuts from song to song and guest to guest. "It helped us understand how all of these collaborators could live together," says Bangalter, "because if you look at this bizarre list of people on paper, you could be like, 'Whoa, that's gonna be a big mess.'" While figuring out what direction the album would eventually take, the two considered indexing the whole thing as one big track, like Prince's Lovesexy , or even releasing a quadruple album.

But of all the moving parts that make up Random Access Memories , the most head-scratching section to put together was the album's eight-minute centerpiece, "Touch". The kaleidoscopic track stars 72-year-old Paul Williams, who wrote immense hits for the Carpenters, Barbra Streisand, and more in his 70s heyday, before descending into drug and alcohol abuse in the 80s, and then recovering in the 90s. Daft Punk were obsessed with Williams from an early age, largely due to his role in director Brian De Palma's schlocky 1974 pop opus Phantom of the Paradise , in which he plays a Faustian ghoul who trades his soul in order to become rock'n'roll's preeminent impresario. The movie is ridiculous, funny, entertaining, and endlessly referential-- just like Daft Punk. (At one point during our interview, Bangalter let it slip that he and de Homem-Christo recently had a meeting with De Palma to "discuss some things," though he declined to divulge any specifics.)

For inspiration, Bangalter gave Williams a book of stories about people who had died, came back to life, and remembered parts of past lives. And Williams' lyrics are about an awakening: "I remember touch," he croons, longingly. "As somebody who has been pronounced dead and came back, I could connect to this idea in the song," says Williams, who's now 23 years sober and the subject of the quietly triumphant recent documentary Still Alive ." Meanwhile, the song warps and bends, floating through genres, epochs, and emotions with a sense of hallucinatory wonder, recalling nothing less than the Beatles' "A Day in the Life". "It's like the core of the record," says de Homem-Christo, "and the memories of the other tracks are revolving around it."

As Bangalter and de Homem-Christo talk about "Touch", there's still a sense of astonishment in their voices. "It was the most complicated thing we've ever done," says Bangalter. "And it became so exciting because it didn't feel like we took the easy route. With this record, we had the luxury to do things that so many people cannot do, but it doesn't mean that with luxury comes comfort." It's this high-stakes, high-wire mindset that keeps these guys in an enviable position within the collective imagination, no matter how long they take between magic tricks. Because if Daft Punk are still able to amaze themselves, there's still some hope for the rest of us.

(Additional reporting by Michael Renaud)

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