Daft Punk
Daft Punk were a French electronic music duo formed in 1993 in Paris by Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. They achieved early popularity in the late 1990s as part of the French house movement, combining elements of house music with funk, disco, techno, rock and synth-pop.[1] The duo garnered further acclaim and commercial success and are now regarded as one of the most influential acts in dance music history.[2]
Daft Punk
Daft Punk formed after Bangalter and de Homem-Christo's former indie rock band, Darlin', disbanded. Their debut studio album, Homework, was released by Virgin Records in 1997 to positive reviews, backed by the singles "Around the World" and "Da Funk". From 1999, Daft Punk assumed robot personas for public appearances, with helmets, outfits and gloves to disguise their identities; they made few media appearances. They were managed from 1996 to 2008 by Pedro Winter, the head of Ed Banger Records.
Daft Punk's second album, Discovery (2001), earned acclaim and further success, with the hit singles "One More Time", "Digital Love" and "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". It became the basis for an animated film, Interstella 5555, supervised by the Japanese artist Leiji Matsumoto. Daft Punk's third album, Human After All (2005), received mixed reviews, though the singles "Robot Rock" and "Technologic" achieved success in the United Kingdom. Daft Punk directed an avant-garde science-fiction film, Electroma, released in 2006. They toured throughout 2006 and 2007 and released the live album Alive 2007, which won a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album; the tour is credited for broadening the appeal of dance music in North America. Daft Punk composed the score for the 2010 film Tron: Legacy.
In 2013, Daft Punk left Virgin for Columbia Records and released their fourth and final album, Random Access Memories, to acclaim; the lead single, "Get Lucky", reached the top 10 in the charts of 27 countries. Random Access Memories won five Grammy Awards in 2014, including Album of the Year and Record of the Year for "Get Lucky". In 2016, Daft Punk gained their only number one on the Billboard Hot 100 with "Starboy", a collaboration with the Weeknd. In 2015, Rolling Stone ranked them the 12th greatest musical duo of all time; the same publication has included two of their albums on their list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. They announced their split in 2021.
Artistry[edit]
Musical style[edit]
Daft Punk's musical style has mainly been described as house,[115][116] French house,[116] electronic,[22] dance,[116][117] and disco.[116][22] Sean Cooper of AllMusic describes their musical style as a blend of acid house, techno, pop, indie rock, hip hop, progressive house, funk, and electro.[116] The Guardian critic Alexis Petridis described their approach to music and art as "magpie"-like, with extensive sampling.[36] Daft Punk saw their style as "retrofuturist", incorporating genres from earlier decades into what the New York Times described as "an increasingly grand vision of joyful populism".[103]
In the early 1990s, Daft Punk drew inspiration from rock and acid house in the UK. Homem-Christo referred to Screamadelica by Primal Scream as the record that "put everything together" in terms of genre.[118] In 2009, Bangalter named Andy Warhol as one of Daft Punk's early influences.[119] On the Homework track "Teachers", Daft Punk list musicians who influenced them, including the funk musician George Clinton, the rapper and producer Dr Dre, and Chicago house and Detroit techno artists including Paul Johnson,[36] Romanthony and Todd Edwards.[7] Homem-Christo said: "Their music had a big effect on us. The sound of their productions—the compression, the sound of the kick drum and Romanthony's voice, the emotion and soul—is part of how we sound today."[7]
Discovery saw Daft Punk integrating influences from 70s disco and 80s crooners, and featured collaborations with Romanthony and Edwards. A major inspiration was the 1999 Aphex Twin single "Windowlicker", which Bangalter said was "neither a purely club track nor a very chilled-out, down-tempo relaxation track".[120] The duo used vintage equipment to recreate sounds from older artists, such as the use of a Wurlitzer piano to evoke Supertramp on "Digital Love".[121]
For the Tron: Legacy soundtrack, Daft Punk drew inspiration from Wendy Carlos, the composer of the original Tron film, as well as Max Steiner, Bernard Herrmann, John Carpenter, Vangelis, Philip Glass and Maurice Jarre.[122][123] For Random Access Memories, Daft Punk sought a "west coast vibe", referencing acts such as Fleetwood Mac, the Doobie Brothers and the Eagles,[124] and the French electronic musician Jean Michel Jarre.[125]
Image[edit]
For most public and media appearances, Daft Punk wore costumes that concealed their faces.[126] Bangalter said they wanted the focus to be on their music,[127] and that masks allowed them to control their image while retaining their anonymity and protecting their personal lives.[8] He said that the 1974 film Phantom of the Paradise, in which the title character prominently wears a mask, was "the foundation for a lot of what we're about artistically".[128][129] Daft Punk were also fans of the 1970s band Space, known for wearing space suits with helmets that hid their appearance.[130] The mystery of Daft Punk's identity and their elaborate disguises added to their popularity.[118] The costumes have been compared to the makeup of Kiss and the leather jacket worn by Iggy Pop.[131]
Legacy[edit]
Daft Punk are regarded as one of the most influential dance acts in history.[152][153][2] In 2015, Rolling Stone ranked them the 12th greatest musical duo of all time.[154] The chief Guardian music critic Alexis Petridis named Daft Punk the most influential pop artists of the 21st century.[2] Their collaborator Pharrell Williams said they were responsible for the rise of contemporary EDM, though Bangalter was noncommittal about this, saying only that other acts were using "gimmicks that at the time [Daft Punk used them] were not really gimmicks".[2] The New York Times credited Daft Punk with helping make dance music "fully mainstream".[103]
In "Losing My Edge", the first single by LCD Soundsystem, singer James Murphy jokingly bragged about being the first to "play Daft Punk to the rock kids".[155] LCD Soundsystem also recorded the song "Daft Punk Is Playing at My House", which reached No. 29 in the UK and was nominated for Best Dance Recording at the 2006 Grammy Awards.[156] The Soulwax remix of the song also contains samples of many Daft Punk tracks as well as tracks by Thomas Bangalter.[157]
Daft Punk tracks have been sampled or covered by other artists. "Technologic" was sampled by Swizz Beatz for the Busta Rhymes song "Touch It". In a later remix of "Touch It" the line "touch it, bring it, pay it, watch it, turn it, leave it, start, format it" from "Technologic" was sung by R&B and rap artist Missy Elliott. Kanye West's 2007 song "Stronger" from the album Graduation borrows the melody and features a vocal sample of Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". Daft Punk's robotic costumes make an appearance in the music video for "Stronger".[39] The track "Daftendirekt" from Daft Punk's album Homework was sampled for the Janet Jackson song "So Much Betta" from her 2008 album Discipline.[158]
The track "Aerodynamic" was sampled for Wiley's 2008 single "Summertime".[159] "Veridis Quo" from Discovery was sampled for the Jazmine Sullivan song "Dream Big" from her 2008 album Fearless.[160] Daft Punk's "Around the World" was sampled for JoJo's 2009 song "You Take Me (Around the World)". The song "Cowboy George" by The Fall contains a clip of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger".[161] A cappella group Pentatonix performed a medley of Daft Punk songs, released as a YouTube video.[162] As of November 2021, the video had been viewed over 355 million times. The medley won for Best Arrangement, Instrumental or a Cappella of the 57th Grammy Awards.[163]
A Daft Punk medley was played at the 2017 Bastille Day parade by a French military band, in front of French President Emmanuel Macron and his many guests, which included US President Donald Trump.[164][165]
Baicalellia daftpunka, a species of flatworm, was named after Daft Punk in 2018 because part of the organism resembles a helmet.[166]
In February 2024, Madame Tussauds New York unveiled their wax figures of Daft Punk.[167][168]