Music! Daft Punk Edition (Also, Whoops)

So, I completely and totally missed a post yesterday.  I don't know if it's because I thought I'd already done one, since I've done a few early ones here lately, or if it's because my subconscious went, "You don't have anything to blog about anyway", but it happened.  And for that, I apologize.  But it's a new night, and for a lack of post last night, I'm going to go ahead and find two things to speak on tonight to catch me up.


So I'll go ahead and get right into it with this post by gushing about Daft Punk, since, well, that's easy for me to do.  By far, one of the only bands I can get back into at the drop of a hat, even when I think I've had my fill lately.

I imagine, given how recently it was, the first thing that comes into most people's mind, regarding Daft Punk is the soundtrack they put together for Tron: Legacy.  Which is fine; I've heard some of it, and it sounds really neat.  I intend on getting my hands on the actual soundtrack to give a listen to eventually, but just haven't gotten around to it yet.  Just a few snippets here and there from a playthrough of the game that I was watching (that hasn't updated in a while) and hearing music from the trailers.

But, and at the risk of being a music snob here, Daft Punk has been in my rotation for years prior to Tron: Legacy.

Way, way, way back in the beforetimes, when Cartoon Network apparently really wanted to get people into Anime, they crafted this block of programming called Toonami, which I have touched on before, and one day, they just decided "You know what?  Let's play music videos.  Cool music videos.  That are animated."  Among them were a nifty Claymation video of a Kenna song (I believe), a couple animated videos from the Gorillaz, and the first four sections of Interstella 5555, which is basically one long Anime music video made for Daft Punk's "Discovery" album.  Like, the entire thing.  Continuously.  Which, I honestly think was my first introduction to Daft Punk.



And it's honestly not a bad intro to them, for the uninitiated.  Which is likely a very small faction anymore, but still.

I don't remember when it happened, only that I know it did, since I have it, but I picked up the "Discovery" album sometime and played the living hell out of it.  But eventually, Daft Punk sort of faded into the distance, especially after the new album "Human After All" came out, leading "Robot Rock" as a single and I didn't really dig it at the time.

Which, honestly, even now is a bit more mood-dependent for me on whether I like it or not.  It's a bit repetitive, obviously, even though it's got a fairly good beat and sound to it.  It just seems to lack that spark that Discovery had en masse.

Years later, and I don't even remember why, but Daft Punk was suddenly thrust back into my life, when a buddy of mine started talking about them and I went, "Man, I haven't listened to them in forever.  I really should."  To which he responded, "So I guess you haven't heard anything off of their live album?" and I said "No, I wasn't aware such a thing existed."  That night became a musical journey, my friends.  He linked me to this song and told me to thank him later, which I am doing the same for you.  However, I must say, if you're going to listen to this song, make sure you listen to Robot Rock first.

Alive 2007 gets even better with certain songs, but I'll never forget hearing this for the first time, being so perfect a blend of two of their songs, and then going on to realize that that was the entire live show.  Remixing songs of theirs into each other for one big musical mash-up of delicious.  If you like this, I would urge you to seek out the rest, especially the encore.

So, there you go.  That is essentially my relationship with Daft Punk; important to me as a kid, not so much as a teen, important again now and likely far into the future.  Carry on, you brilliant robots.