With all the hype surrounding the release of Daft Punk‘s new album, I can think of a book full of people that would kill me for the opportunity to officially listen to Random Access Memories before it releases to the world.

But those are one of the perks of writing about music. That’s what Team Bangin Beats got to do this Tuesday morning. We were invited to the official streaming of Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories, hosted by Sony Music India at Cafe Zoe, at Lower Parel, Mumbai. We walked into the mezzanine level at Cafe Zoe and we were welcomed by a handful of music enthusiasts, a delicious breakfast spread, Daft Punk memorabilia scattered around and “Digital Love” setting the mood for the morning.

Before the newest album started off, the Managing Director Of Sony Music India, Mr.Shridhar Subramaniam, raised a quaint little welcome toast to all that were present, and to the launch and success of Daft Punk’s newest album.

The people present went for the champagne, while the speakers started to sound sweet once again after 8 years! The Church of Daft Punk was in session, and we were transported right back in to the funky era of raw disco groove. “Give Life Back To Music“, unlike the expected boom boom sound of electronic, is a fusion of rock, pop and the usual twisted Daft Punk beat we’ve come to love. It’s extremely tough to club this under a genre, for this is a simple track that fuses tunes across a myriad of genres! Indeed, life has pumped right through the centre of the human heart with this simple yet ridiculously groovy tune. The vocals are the trademark robotic banter that are inherent with almost all of their releases.

“Game Of Love“ is more relaxed, and ambient in nature, but definitely one that you can swing to. With dreamy vocals, a slow disco funk  guitar chord progression, dreamy electronic piano inputs, and a more mellow version of the robot’s auto tuned vocals. The song, ironically, is a machine’s take on love, human emotion and heart break. What makes it more complete is a very groovy sounding guitar solo towards the end.

“Giorgio by Moroder” is going to rule the radio waves for a very long time. This is the defining track of the album and sort of a tribute to the versatile musician that is Giorgio Moroder. Starting with Messrs Moroder’s interview snippet from the Creators Project video, this tune drops raw groove right at the start; a warped, twirling vortex of disco, the sound is fresh and yet takes us back into time with a very very simple synth progression about halfway through the track, when it mellows with  Super-Mario brothers-esque tune! Graced once again by the soothing and amiable voice of Giovanni Giorgio, there’s once again a simple breakdown into a dreamy violin and synth sequence that merges with the groovy beat as the track progresses. The drums do more than justice to the track, for its not the digital drum kick we’ve gotten accustomed to, but a human rendition of what Daft Punk aimed to achieve (going by their statement to Pete Tong on BBC Radio 1). The guitar takes over the track with a rush that bound to give you the bumps! All in all, this is a complete tune, and one that will be stuck with you for a very very long time.

A beautifully pristine piano riff breaks in at the start of “Within“, followed by a simple snare build up. With a lamenting robot voice, it’s an A.I. ballad that’s meant to shed light on the lonerisms of a robot. A tad bit monotonous but still very true to the entire retro funk vibe of the album.

“Instant Crush” has The Strokes’ frontman Julius Casablancas on the vocals and he’s done a damn good job with it! Although his excellent voice has been twisted to sound more adhering to the mechanical spirit of Daft Punk, it perfectly fits into the purpose of Random Access Memories, i.e, two robots getting humans to set the idea of old school straight once again!

Arguably one of the danciest tracks from the album, “Lose Yourself To Dance” will easily make anyone get to groovin’ Travolta style, circa. Saturday Night Fever. Featuring Pharell Williams telling you to “Lose Yourself To Dance”, amidst a swarm of ultra rhythmic guitar riffs, a thundering flicked bass, and a pounding breakbeat. Adding to the whole vibe, are the robots urging you to “C’mon”.  Definitely reminiscent of the whole afro oriented, bell bottom dominated bangin’ 70’s.

An epic 8 minute opus of Daft Punk goodness, “Touch” starts of like a dream; as if the bots were traversing space and time in a parallel dimension along with singer-songwriter Paul Williams. The omnipresent input of a funk guitar is evident throughout the track, along with a showroom-esque orchestra, that includes a soulful saxophone, and a funky grand paino riff, alot of which are akin to to snazzy 80’s nightclub. (Think Miami Vice or Magnum P.I.)  There is a sudden transition into the slow starry-eyed dream more than halfway through the song.

This is followed by the single that started it all. Previews of which were heard on Daft Punk’s  SNL ads, and snippets of the video which initially premiered at the Coachella festival. It’s the uber funky “Get Lucky”, featuring the soulful vocals of Pharell Williams,  and the chic guitar work of retro axe-king, Nile Rodgers.  It’s the first single that was released to general public, already number 1 on beatport and in the top 20 of the billboard top 100. It’s got a simple-yet catchy hook and a futuristic robo-breakdown. But I’m sure most of you reading this already know what I’m talking about.

With an introduction that sounds almost like an excerpt from the Star Trek soundtrack, “Beyond” starts off quite impressively till its cut off by clunky guitar strumming. Laden with the regular robo vocals that speak bellow out introspective, somewhat philosophical lyrics like “This is the journey of the soul…” finally ending with a space life riff that’s best listened to in your lonesome.

“Motherboard” is a soothing instrumental jam, with an ever present and ever soothing sound of the flute with dollops of melodies here and there. There’s some stellar drumming accompanying the track through its entirety. About four minutes into the track there are sounds from the outer space rumbling about, giving it an edgy feel. The only word that could best describe it is ‘trippy’.

Todd Edwards does an excellent job on “Fragments of Time” which is a direct transport to “Face to Face” from their massive album that was “Discovery”. Again, this is a tune reminiscent of the 80s when music was more human, simpler and something that everyone could relate to. With due diligence, the synth induces a feeling of goodness and sets the mood right for an impending amorous evening. “Making it feel like I’m 17 and its cryyyystal clear…Turning our days into melodies”. Great lyrics!

“Doin’ It Right”  is the point of this album. Self proclamation in a cheeky sense, we know it’s exactly what the robots are aiming at telling the world. A wonderfully engineered contrast can be felt in the vocals immediately with the mechanical rendition of the lines “Everybody will be dancing if we’re doin’ it right; Everybody will be dancing and feeling it right” (So True!) and the earnest vocals of Animal Collective’s Panda Bear, repeating the chorus “If you do it right, letting go all night, shadows on you break out into the light.” It’s an all out feel good track, with Daft Punk’s signature stamp on it, replete with very intelligent drumming. We’ll have to agree with Daft Punk on this one. Yeah! They’re definitely doin’ it right.

“Contact” is a perfect measure of  Daft Punk’s inherent futuristic theme. Starting off with an astronaut’s description of an unidentified object in outer space, building up to a powerful chord progression on the organs, and a manic synth riff that just hooks on to you like leech. The almost maniacal offbeat plummeting on the drums adds to the space-age rush that defines this track. Midway through there’s a synth riff gives way to a harder guitar riff, pumping the song to an almost out of reach, insanity driven high. All this till it abruptly ends  to a stop with only a high pitched flanger induced synth still keeping you on the edge of your seat before dropping you to the end of a wonderful journey to what could be described as another dimension, where retro-funk meets futuristic sounds. A journey filled with energy filled highs and amazingly mellow lows.

All in all, though some tracks don’t really live up to the hype, other’s like Giorgio By Moroder, Contact, and Instant Crush, make up for the rest in a huge way. The lack of post modern digital samples and computer fiddlery is immediately noticeable from start to finish. You can see why they take such long hiatus’ between each album. It’s only because they actually compose each and every bit of their production, straight from scratch, however minimilastic the end product may seem. It’s wonderful to see the masterminds of electronica doing what they do best, once again. Till the next one, we can only pretend to get lucky!

Review by Shule Puri and Sheel Bhattacharjee