My Favorite Albums of 2015

2015 was an excellent year for music. There were great albums from an array of artists, bands and performers across all kinds of genres. Per usual, these were my 10 favorite albums (all my opinion, I'm not saying that these albums were any "better" than others).

There was so much good music this year which I was able to find and enjoy, largely thanks to Spotify, that this year I am including an honorable mention list.

Honorable Mentions

In no particular order:

• Ghostface Killah & Badbadnotgood: SOUR SOUL - Genre defying beats from neo-jazz(?) combo Badbadnotgood with verses from Ghostface Killah
• Phony Ppl: Yesterday’s Tomorrow - Hip hop/R&B/soul fusion from relative unknowns Phony Ppl. Highly recommended for fans of N*E*R*D, check out "End of the niGht"
• Julia Holter: Have You In My Wilderness - Really beautiful songs with lush orchestration. Holter created a beautifully dense album that is not an easy listen but a powerful one.
• GoldLink: And After That, We Didn’t Talk - GoldLink is not a household name in rap but he could be with more genre-blending beats and smart lyrics like this.
• Tuxedo: Tuxedo - Mayer Hawthorne and Jake One team up for this album of throwback, impossibly danceable, 80s grooves.
• Kamasi Washington: The Epic - Big, brash, intense jazz from saxophonist and arranger Kamasi Washington, who was also responsible for much of the orchestration on Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly (more on that one later)
• The Chemical Brothers: Born in the Echoes - Heavy arena dance music with a lot of big cameos. Check out "Wide Open" featuring Beck.  
• Jamie Woon: Making Time - Crooning soul with a modern flavor from former dubstep producer Jamie Woon. This one just missed the top 10, check out "Sharpness" and "Celebration"
• Snarky Puppy & Metropole Orkest: Sylva - a massive collaboration with the 9-piece Snarky Puppy and full orchestra of Metropole Orkest. One of my favorite groups, Snarky Puppy releases are never to be missed. 
• Umphrey's Mcgee: The London Session - recorded at Abbey Road, and including a Beatles cover (bold), new releases from UM are always a must listen (and if they're in town, go see them!!)

The Top 10 

10. Snoop Dogg - BUSH

It would be easy to dismiss the 12th studio album from rap/stoner mogul Snoop Dogg who may seem more focused on selling his new brands of kush and vape pens than making music. But his music is really good! Pharrell and Snoop are reunited with spectacular results. It's a fun album with cool, California beats best enjoyed with a pair of good headphones.

Top tracks: "This City",  "Peaches N Cream"

9. The Internet - Ego Death

The Internet blend R&B with jazz and hip hop for a smooth sound fronted by female lead singer and songwriter Sydney Barrett (aka Syd the Kid). It's honest and personal songs performed by top rate musicians. I love their fender-rhodes heavy sound. Check out their Tiny Desk concert from earlier this year.

Top tracks: "Under Control", "For the World", "Girl"

8. Hiatus Kaiyote - Choose Your Weapon

Hiatus Kaiyote's website describes their sound as "Multi-Dimensional, Polyrhythmic Gangster Shit." Can't say I disagree. Much like The Internet, I love their sound, particularly the heavy use of keyboards and the alto vocals. Mired by a lot of forgettable tracks, Choose Your Weapon features several gems from the Australian quartet. Only their second album, I look forward to the future of Hiatus Kaiyote because their ceiling is very high.

Top tracks: "Breathing Underwater", "Shaolin Monk Motherfunk", "Molasses"  

7. D'Angelo - Black Messiah

14 years out of the spotlight, rumors of his demise circulating and out of the blue D'Angelo releases an album this good?? This was one of the top surprise albums of 2015 (late 2014 really, it was released December 2014). Anticipation for D'Angelo's return has always been high and Black Messiah did not disappoint, with its socially conscious and deep lyrics. It was innovative without getting too far away from what has always made D'Angelo great. 

Top tracks: "Really Love", "Sugah Daddy"

6. Big Data - 2.0

No, that's not a broken image, that is the album cover for Big Data's 2.0. Not as fluid an album as some others on this list, 2.0 features great individual tracks throughout. Big Data layers themes of mankind v technology on top of catchy grooves interspersed with top collaborators, many of whom I am a fan. This was a very underrated album in 2015.

Top tracks: "Dangerous" featuring Joywave, "Clean" feat. Jamie Lidell, "Big Dater"

5. Alabama Shakes - Sound & Color

Successful both commercially and critically, Sound & Color was always going to make this list. The Alabama Shakes were popular as soon as America heard their blues/southern-rock sound but this album solidified them as festival headliners. The band has an accessible retro blues rock sound (currently very popular) but Brittany Howard's lead vocals are what make the band.

Top tracks: "Don't Wanna Fight No More", "Sound & Color"

4. Hot Chip - Why Make Sense?

Hot Chip's alt-dance album opens with one of my favorite tracks of 2015 "Haurache Lights." Why Make Sense? features layered electro-grooves in a way that makes a synthesizer player jealous. This album is as high as #4 partly because I had the pleasure of seeing Hot Chip live this past year. They were an awesome show unlike any other group I had seen. The show was a dance party anchored by 5 middle-aged white synthesizer players, who passed around 1 guitar, and a damn good drummer. A wall of keyboards, Hot Chip has a very unique sound and some excellent songs that make for a great live show.

Top tracks: "Haurache Lights", "Cry for You", "Dark Night"

The Top 3

These top three are all outstanding albums worthy of significant acclaim but I particularly enjoyed them. These were the albums that made up a lot of my Spotify plays in 2015 and I'll continue listening to them in the future. In another year, any of these could have been my #1.

3. Tame Impala - Currents

Currents is an already great band taking a big risk with their next album and achieving incredible results. Tame Impala builds upon their distorted guitar rock sound from Innerspeaker and Lonerism, favoring a new, more electric and danceable mix. This is clear right from the first track "Let it Happen", which features an almost 8 minute synth-dance loop. Currents blends genres in a way that is greater than the sum of its parts, blending psychedelic rock with dancefloor pop with funk with progressive rock with Motown at times, just to name a few. Not to be lost in the band's mesmerizing sound is how well written the songs are. Is there a better lamentation of the male experience of pleading with an unhappy female than "'Cause I'm a Man"? Kevin Parker and Tame Impala continue to impress and I can't wait for whatever their next record includes.

Top tracks: "'Cause I'm a Man", "Let it Happen", "Yes I'm Changing", "The Less I Know the Better"

2. Mark Ronson - Uptown Special

To reduce Uptown Special to "Uptown Funk" and 10 other songs would be a tremendous disservice to Mark Ronson's best album. Featuring an all-star cast of collaborators, Uptown Special is a brilliantly produced album of pop/funk/R&B singles which all stand on their own. Ronson and co-producer Jeff Bhasker expertly crafted a fun dance album for 2015. Kevin Parker, of Tame Impala, features prominently with the Steely Dan-esque "Summer Breaking", the psychedelic "Daffodils", and the goodbye to hipsterhood that is "Leaving Los Feliz". Mystikal makes the comeback we never knew we needed channeling James Brown on "Feel Right". Stevie Wonder(!) even bookends the album lending his harmonica to the opening and closing tracks. And of course there is Bruno Mars on the now classic "Uptown Funk". 

Top tracks: "Uptown Funk", "Feel Right", "Daffodils", "In Case of Fire", "Summer Breaking"

Bonus track!: "Hit Me" by Mystikal - this dancefloor track inspired Ronson to contact Mystikal. The world needs a whole Mystikal album in his newfound style.

1. Kendrick Lamar - To Pimp a Butterfly

This choice was an easy one. Right from the first listen, it was apparent that To Pimp a Butterfly is a special album, described by some as Kendrick Lamar's "magnum opus." As soon as you hit the second track "For Free?", a free-jazz interlude, it's apparent that Kendrick Lamar is simply on the next level. What can I say that hasn't been said about this album? Nominated for 11 Grammys (should absolutely win Album of the Year), To Pimp a Butterfly makes use of jazz, hip hop and rap instrumental tracks with expertly crafted lyrics from K Dot to paint a vivid picture of the black American experience in 2015. This album couldn't have been released at a better (or worse) time than March of 2015, given the past year's racial friction in America. The instrumentals and vocals are both phenomenal. Incredibly dense and thought provoking, there are many reasons why To Pimp a Butterfly was #1 on a ton of 2015 in review lists. With a 96 rating on Metacritic, read the reviews there if you are interested in reading more. I'll be rooting for Kendrick at the Grammys in February.

Top tracks (seriously, listen to the whole thing): "King Kunta", "How Much a Dollar Cost", "Alright", "The Blacker the Berry", "Wesley's Theory"

My Favorite Albums of 2014

(I must preface this by saying it is all completely my opinion. I am not claiming any of this to be fact, or that any of these are the "best"; it's purely based on my taste and I welcome disagreement or discussion. The title of the blog does a good job of getting that out of the way.)

It's the time of the year when the leaves have fallen, a chill is in the air, Christmas lights with decorations fill the windows, my wallet is hurting, and I feel reflective on the past year. Personally, 2014 has been a wonderful year surrounded by great people and I hope to continue that momentum into 2015.

Musically, 2014 brought some exciting new acts like Sam Smith and solidified other already known artists like Ed Sheeran. On the whole, I preferred the new music from 2013 to that of 2014. Daft Punk's Random Access Memories, released May 2013, was a monumental album and those don't come around every year. But I feel the music industry in a good place. There's a lot of good being music being made and it continues to be more and more accessible to the listener.

My favorite albums of 2014:


10. They Want My Soul - Spoon

Spoon was relatively unfamiliar to me before 2014, admittedly I didn't watch any of The O.C. during high school. But I had the opportunity to see them at Boston Calling this year and they are a solid group with an extensive collection of good songs. They Want My Soul adds some more well written songs to Spoon's catalogue, in particular the expressive and catchy "Do You".

9. This is All Yours - Alt-J

Indie rock is not typically my cup of tea. Alt-J's 2012 debut album, An Awesome Wave, was promising. This is All Yours in 2014, which got a lot of love from Spotify, was a solid followup. Alt-J's has an expressive, often mellow, sound. But the group can also groove with well sung vocals. The chorus of "Left Hand Free" may be the best use of cowbell since Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper". Bruce Dickinson would be proud.

8. X - Ed Sheeran

Ed Sheeran's sophomore album X solidified Sheeran as a major player in pop music. And "Sing", its debut track, is an example of what happens when talented artists collaborate with Pharrell Williams. Slightly out of his acoustic comfort zone, "Sing" adds the rhythmic punctuation some of his ballads are missing. On the rest of X, Sheeran can croon with the best of them. Though I must admit that it is weird seeing young women fall in love with a goofy looking ginger from England.

7. Singles - Future Islands

Isn't it refreshing when a band puts their best track first on the album? The opening track "Seasons (Waiting on You)" is one of the best by a relatively unknown in 2014. The vocals are superb, so emotive and powerful. Lyrically, "Seasons" is about love lost, metaphorically to the Winter with a craving to summers future. The rest of the album continues the momentum. The instrumentation of 80s rhythmic synth lines with often times heavy guitars and exceptional vocals that sound almost late Elton John-esque gives Future Islands an exciting and distinct sound.

6. Similar Skin - Umphrey's McGee

For a group best known for their live shows, Umphrey's McGee makes damn good studio albums, too. Similar Skin features Umphrey's doing what they do best, which is rock. The piano driven "No Diablo" is quickly becoming one of my UM favorites (though as a piano player, I may be biased). Beloved by the jam band community and their cult following of Umphreaks (including members of ESPN's Around the Horn for which UM does the theme song!), Umphrey's McGee should be appreciated by all fans of rock and roll.

5. You're Dead - Flying Lotus

When I heard Herbie Hancock would be collaborating with Flying Lotus, I was excited. FlyLo (the nephew of Alice and John Coltrane) reached new levels of avant-garde with You're Dead, an album composed of 19 tracks about death. Somehow, it tackles the subject being both lighthearted and psychedelic. It's difficult to put this album into any genre but it has audible influences of experimental jazz, hip hop and soul. Its best track "Never Catch Me" features Kendrick Lamar who is stellar. Flying Lotus' bassist and collaborator, Thundercat, is excellent throughout.

4. It's Album Time - Todd Terje

Todd Terje had been making singles/EPs in Norway for a couple years prior so it's appropriate that his first album was named It's Album Time. Terje is a slick producer of 21st century electric-disco. Reminiscent of Giorgio Moroder, It's Album Time flows from one danceable groove to the next. The layers of synthesizers create a beautiful, rich sound combining interesting harmonies with tight grooves. "Delorean Dynamite" would be the perfect score for an action movie car chase scene (I love driving to this track). The goofy album art speaks to Album Time's fun nature. Terje's musicianship makes this enjoyable album one of my favorites of 2014.

3. Because the Internet - Childish Gambino

[Side note: this album was released in December 2013 but for all intents and purposes, I'm calling it 2014. Which I guess is ironic given the album's theme of the internet's influence and its instantaneousness. Regardless...]

What can't Donald Glover do? Because the Internet is packed with great tracks connected by a common theme that, well, this is a crazy time to be alive. By nature, all music is a product of the time when it is written. But Because the Internet comes off like an album written about the time when it is a product. Gambino is a gifted lyricist who is both emotive and witty (needless to say, Donald Glover is a brilliant guy). This is an angry album and it's superbly produced with myriad layers of sound. It may be top heavy (the first half is superior) but it's an excellent, heavily detailed, headphones album. I got to see it performed at Boston Calling, which was also excellent but for very different reasons. Gambino loves to yell for the crowd to BOUNCE which tends to get the people going. "Crawl", the opening track, is my favorite though the whole first half of the album is excellent and should be listened to fluidly.

2. We Like it Here - Snarky Puppy

Snarky Puppy is one of my favorite bands currently in its prime. The 8+ piece band made up of monster musicians who met at the University of North Texas continues to pave its own way in jazz/rock music. Playing hundreds of shows while consistently producing albums each year, Snarky Puppy is one of the hardest working bands today. These are monster players with tight, interesting arrangements, creating a very new sound using 20 (twenty!) musicians on this album which was recorded live-ish (watch the videos). The keyboard solo on "Lingus" beginning at 4:18 is prodigious; I love watching the reactions of the other people in the room, particularly the other keyboardist. Both a great headphone listen and live show, Snarky Puppy is a band in its prime and I think they like it here.

1. GIRL - Pharrell Williams

Pharrell Williams went from being a superstar to a super-mega-colossal-star. If you watched the Nickelodeon game show "GUTS", then you are familiar with the "Crag." GUTS was a game show in which kids competed in a series of physical challenges. The Crag was the show's final round in with each season it got larger and longer in its name. The Crag became the Aggro Crag, then the Super Aggro Crag. By the end I think it was the Super Nitro Colossal Aggro Crag but then again I was 6 years old. Anyway, that's Pharrell Williams. In 2014, Pharrell is Super Nitro Colossal Aggro Pharrell Williams.

With GIRL, Pharrell can add a major solo album to his accomplishments. Although the biggest track on the album is undoubtedly "Happy", it's impossible to speak objectively about a song that was played billions of times in the past year (I'm writing this, over 516 million times on YouTube alone). But my favorite track may be "Gust of Wind". "Gust of Wind" has a great groove, lush string arrangements, and a catchy talkbox hook provided by Daft Punk. Tragically, it's marred by horrible lyrics (When I open the window / I wanna hug you / cause you remind me of the air / I said, yeah). But I love the jazzy keyboard voicings with the text painting by the strings (the sweeping, ascending and descending line at the beginning sounds like, well, a gust of wind). Top to bottom a great pop album.

Comparing Contemporary Crooners: Justin Timberlake & Robin Thicke

There are many similarities in the musical style and presentation of Justin Timberlake and Robin Thicke. Grantland wrote a brilliant piece about how Thicke has filled the niche that Timberlake left void by plunging into the 20/20 Experience. It’s a great read and I won’t steal any of its points. Rather, I’d like to present a comparison of the pair’s 2013 albums: The 20/20 Experience and Blurred Lines.

It’s worth noting that the background for these two artists is extremely different. Timberlake, of N*SYNC and the Mickey Mouse Club, has always been successful, at least commercially. You won’t find many music bloggers who wrote about the artistic merits of N*SYNC (partially because bloggers didn’t really exist in 1998 and boy bands have never been revered by the artistic community). Robin Thicke never had a mega-hit before Blurred Lines although he was making some very good music. 2006’s The Evolution of Robin Thicke is an underrated album featuring production from the brilliant Pharrell. Thicke was making quality music while flying somewhat under the radar. All he needed was a dozen women dancing naked around him to launch his career as a superstar (interestingly, this had the opposite effect on Tiger Woods’ career).

[I must add that I find Robin Thicke comical. His hair style is illogical and Alan Thicke is his father. But his infatuation with sex makes him seem almost a caricature, like the horny friend in a high school/college comedy (Stiffler). As a judge on the show “Duets,” his criticisms were consistently that the performances needed more sexuality. It could have been a father and daughter singing “Unforgettable,” Robin Thicke thought it needed more sexual chemistry.]

Blurred Lines

The naked women dancing around Robin Thicke are featured in his Blurred Lines music video. If you haven’t seen the uncensored video, here it is courtesy of YouTube’s ugly stepchild, Vevo. It is devoid of any subtlety from the nude women, the “#THICKE” hashtag blasted in your face every ten seconds, to the highlight of the video: balloons that spell out “Robin Thicke Has a Big Dick.” It’s brash, it’s provocative, it's fun, and it’s a feminist’s worst nightmare. It can be argued that the song is about rape, or at least nonconsensual sex, which most lawyers would argue is rape. “I know you want it,” “you’re a good girl,” “I hate those blurred lines”… “Blurred lines” may represent the blurred line of sexual consent. (This theory has gotten mixed reactions from people. They may not be “Baby it’s Cold Outside,” but the lyrics have a Dennis Reynolds “implication” feel to them.)  

However, musically, there is nothing offensive about Blurred Lines. It’s a two chord tune with a feel that emulates Marvin Gaye’s Got to Give It Up. It’s simple, it’s catchy, and it’s four minutes long. The same can be said of the rest of the Blurred Lines album. The lyrics are adventurous and consistently sexual, but there is nothing adventurous about the music. Blurred Lines is 13 tracks long, none of which are longer than four minutes. The whole album is very listenable, particularly the disco-esque Ooo La La, Ain’t No Hat 4 That (though I have no idea what it means), and the contemporary sounding Give it 2 U. Blurred Lines is as digestible to pop music listeners as Activia is to Jamie Lee Curtis.

The 20/20 Experience 

Let’s contrast this with Justin Timberlake’s 20/20 Experience. Musically, it’s daunting. The album consists of 10 tracks, none of which are shorter than 4:48 (That Girl). Six of the ten tracks are longer than seven minutes. This is not a format that the casual listener is accustomed to. It’s unorthodox, it’s experimental. When making the album, Timberlake aspired to create long tracks like classic rock bands used to. Each track explores its groove in several different ways. Musically, it’s as digestible as Indian food. It’s spicy and flavorful, but your digestive system probably isn’t going to be happy.

Timberlake went this route because he can. At this point in his career, he didn’t need to turn heads. He strives to be musically innovative and that’s just what he did here. Mirrors is eight minutes long and it still gets played on the radio. There’s no way that an eight minute jam by Robin Thicke, or anyone else without JT’s pedigree, gets radio play.

Lyrically, you would have to be an extreme prude to find anything offensive about most of The 20/20 Experience, except for Pusher Love Girl (which compares love to heroin). There’s nothing edgy about eating truffles in tuxedos, even if it is said by Jay-Z. Most of the songs focus on love in its traditional sense, dancing, and having fun. Timberlake is done bringing sexy back, now he's bringing classy back.

Combining the Conventional and the Unconventional

Blurred Lines and The 20/20 Experience have a similar retro 70’s sound and are both very successful albums, yet their goals are very different. Thicke aspires to turn heads with unorthodox lyrics and brash sexuality, on top of fairly conservative music. Timberlake aspires to innovate musically, challenging pop music conventions, while appeasing the listener with generally wholesome lyrics, fortifying his classy persona. Both albums mix the conventional and the unconventional in a way both casual pop fans and music lovers can appreciate.

Looking Back to Look Forward - Daft Punk's "Random Access Memories"

 

Has there ever been a better marketed album prior to its release than Daft Punk's "Random Access Memories?" You would have a hard time finding one. After a brilliant series of video interviews featuring The Collaborators from the album along with hints of the tracks, fans of Daft Punk knew that this was going to be something special. But the promotion left a high level of mystery. Until the album's leak, available streaming on iTunes, fans had no idea what this would sound like. Expectations were extremely high and "Random Access Memories" does not disappoint. Let's jump right into the first track...

"Give Life Back to Music" opens like the opening to an album, not the opening of an individual song. Those first three notes are big, powerful and grandiose. There's a ton of energy in that opening and then it pulls you into a groove that's so silky smooth, you're almost taken aback by it. One of the things Daft Punk has done really well throughout their career is contrast. By opening with brash chords, the slip into the Nile Rodgers driven guitar groove feels like a trip into another world, a world in which pop music hasn't lived in decades.

Throughout the album, the robot voice (vocoder) is a fantastic way to remind the listener that what they are hearing is Daft Punk. "The Game of Love" uses the vocoder vocals well proving that a "robot voice" can be just as expressive (if not more) than a human's.

"Giorgio" is definitely a polarizing track. Putting a 9 minute epic as the third track on your album is bold. But music lovers have to appreciate the incredible composition it is. "Giorgio" is an exploration throughout funk/early electronic music. The personnel on this track is loaded. The talent and technique exhibited throughout Giorgio is inspiring.

My only critique of the album is that it could use horn players. A saxophone, trumpet and/or trombone would have added an additional layer of sound, not to mention brought even more energy to the tracks. Many of the legendary disco groups and songs featured great horn sections. A homage to the disco era feels like it's missing something without horns.

Daft Punk are so attentive to detail in their sound engineering that the spoken sections by Giorgio Moroder (who everybody calls Giorgio) were done with 6 different microphones as he discusses different eras. Would anybody notice that? Probably not. But Daft Punk would. The grand finale, which Giorgio describes as "the sounds of the future," is dazzling.

A piano interlude by the fantastic Chilly Gonzales takes us into "Within." It's a really pretty melody with the most interesting sung lyrics of the album, thus far. "Please tell me who I am," "looking for someone"... these are emotional lyrics. They also take on a very different meaning when sung by a robot. The robots are experiencing emotion. The robots are becoming sentient!! IS NO ONE ELSE TERRIFIED?

Anyway, "Instant Crush" opens with what sounds eerily like Wham!'s "Last Christmas" but is carried by The Strokes' lead singer, Julian Casablancas. The first minute of the song is very a straight ahead groove, heavy on downbeats with little syncopation. When the chorus comes in, it's a brand new tune with a groove heavy on upbeats and syncopation. Due to the contrast between the chorus and verse, the chorus feels even funkier than it is (and it's already very funky). "Instant Crush" has potential to be the album's second big single.

The heaviest hitter among the collaborators, Pharrell Williams, makes his first appearance on the album with "Lose Yourself to Dance." However Pharrell is not the takeaway from this track, it is Nile Rodgers' fantastic playing, again. He is a master of groove, dictating the entire feel of the song with his complex, rhythmic guitar riffs. Rodgers may be the MVP of the album.

"Touch" is a bit out there for me. It's slightly disappointing as it features Paul Williams, composer of maybe the greatest song ever written for a film, "The Rainbow Connection" (which is masterfully sung by a puppet frog on the river, playing a banjo). The climax is grandiose, but it takes a long time to get there.


Here we get the album's hit single (and it's not even close), "Get Lucky." The NY Times piece on the song gives an excellent description of  why "Get Lucky" may be the biggest hit of the summer due to its genre-defiance and marketability. Though played by real drums, the drum track is manipulated to sound driving and almost electronic. Mixed with another great guitar groove by Rodgers and vocals from Pharrell, "Get Lucky" combines modern and disco sounds expertly, especially considering that none of the album's tracks were recorded together.

One way in which "Get Lucky" has Daft Punk's flavor is through the use of the duo's trademark technique of presenting a melody, then a counter-melody, and finally the two melodies on top of each other. In "Get Lucky," it's Pharrell's vocals, the robotic vocoder vocals, and then the two together. It's the blueprint for Discovery, Alive 2007 (in which they combined tracks/melodies from different albums), and a couple songs from Random Access Memories. It's interesting that while the groove may sound totally different, the basic musical structure remains the same.

After a grand orchestral opening, complete with a string section and timpani, "Beyond" falls into a groove reminiscent of Michael McDonald's "I Keep Forgettin'." When recording the album, Daft Punk sought to achieve what they called a "west coast vibe," referencing groups like the Doobie Brothers. Somewhat surprisingly, it was the short lived (and historically under appreciated) Michael McDonald-era of the Doobie Brothers sound that they achieved.

"Motherboard" is a track that will likely be overlooked, but it may be the closest thing to the Daft Punk of old. If Discovery were to be recorded by talented musicians without samples and loops, it would sound something like "Motherboard." It sounds like something out of a spy thriller (think Bourne Identity).

"Fragments of Time" features Todd Edwards, best known for his previous Daft Punk collaboration "Face to Face." While "Face to Face" sampled an Electric Light Orchestra song (Evil Woman), it sounded nothing like a record that could come out of the 1970s. "Fragments of Time" sounds like a Hall & Oates record. It may be cheesy, the lyrics are uninspiring, but it gives a modern touch to an 80s groove that brilliantly creates a new sound. It is a minor detail but in the chorus, in between the sung lyrics, there are a series of isolated guitar and keyboard figures, recorded on different tracks which sound like choppy fragments of phrases. As the song is about "Fragments of Time," Daft Punk continue to show their mastery of sound engineering.

"Doing it Right" features Panda Bear of Animal Collective, one of the more innovative electronic bands today.  It is one of the rare tracks on the album with little to no disco influence. For me, it falls short in terms of energy. The track does not build throughout, though it does use Daft Punk's technique of presenting melody, counter-melody, then the two together. Humans and robots singing in harmony. Beautiful stuff.

"Contact" is a gripping ending which makes great use of a quote from Apollo 17 in which an astronaut gives us reason to believe there is life outside of Earth. The five note phrase after "there's something out there" is chilling. What "Doing it Right" lacks in build, "Contact" more than makes up for. It culminates with an all out headbanging rock feel supporting an ascending synthesizer which sounds like a spaceship leaving Earth. It shows the depth of what the synthesizer can do and just how far it has come.

Earlier in the album, Giorgio discusses the synthesizer as being the sound of the future. With Random Access Memories, Daft Punk have left their mark on what the future should sound like. By recreating sounds of the past, with modern elements, Daft Punk pay homage to music's recent history while setting the bar for contemporaries. It is a timeless album and one that can be appreciated by all fans of music, young and old, not just fans of Daft Punk.

Daft Punk and Wagner May Have More In Common Than You'd Think

I love finding redeeming qualities in popular music. Most of it is such trash, that I am extremely encouraged when I find what I consider to be a great pop song. Recently I stumbled across one, completely not expecting it. Over winter break, I found myself driving in my car, alone, listening to the Daft Punk that I added to my iPod. I know Daft Punk is a pretty popular group, definitely trendy, and I respect their music. I think it takes a lot of talent to do what they do. But I always thought of it as fairly mindless dance music. People aren't really listening to the music for meaning; it functions more as background music.


However, then Digital Love came on. At first I thought, "ok, this is a nice little love song," but as the song progressed, I found myself becoming more and more upset by it. The lyrics start out fairly happy as the narrator describes a romance he has in a dream. But, "before I knew it, the dream was all gone." He then goes on to sing about how he wants to make the dream come true. Sad, but not exactly heartbreaking. It's not like Daft Punk is the first group to ever write a sad love song. As an amateur singer/songwriter, I can tell you, I've written a number of sad love songs, and none of them are all that powerful. As the song continued, I found myself very captivated by it. It left me feeling very tense. Before I break down why I found the song to be so powerful, listen to the song for yourself.





Good stuff. In the past week or two, I've asked a number of people if they've heard the song, and if so, what they thought about it. A number of people have said they like the tune, though they couldn't explain why, and I even got one person who said it's fairly generic and mediocre. So I, with the help of a couple of my roommates, decided to analyze the song and break down why it left me feeling the way it did from a musical standpoint.


After listening to it again, in depth, I realized something that I couldn't believe I hadn't noticed before. The main theme never resolves to the I chord! To the non-musicians, what this means it that it never goes to the chord that you, as a listener, want it to. Pretty much every simple tune you can think of ends on the tonic (I chord). Of course never resolving to the tonic is going to leave the listener very tense! Listening to a 5 minute song and never getting the resolution that your ear is waiting for, leaves you very anxious.


So, why Wagner? Richard Wagner (pronounced vog-ner) was a 19th century German composer who is widely considered to be one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era. I bring him up because he uses a similar, virtually the same, technique in his 1865 opera Tristan und Isolde. It is hailed as one of the greatest operas ever written and according to Wikipedia, "Many see Tristan as the beginning of the move away from conventional harmony and tonality and consider that it lays the groundwork for the direction of classical musical in the 20th century." In other words, the harmony was really groundbreaking and really weird. Coming from someone who took a course on 20th Century Classical Music, I can tell you that it got pretty out there in the 20th century.


What makes Tristan so strange/powerful? For almost the entire duration of the opera, just under 5 hours, it doesn't resolve to the I chord! At the climax of the piece, the very end, it finally resolves to the I chord, and it is said to be an unbelievably powerful experience. Just imagine as a listener, there's something that you want so badly, and are repeatedly being denied it. It leaves you tense and frustrated. And after almost five hours, you are finally rewarded with a triumphant I chord. It's extremely powerful.


Digital Love never resolves to the I chord. In fact, the way the song begins and ends is also brilliant. It opens with a synth suspended chord slowly fading in; not exactly dissonant, but unresolved. The song ends with the same synth chord. In essence, the symmetry of the identical beginning and end shows that the song hasn't really gone anywhere. The listener has ended up right back where they started. And this fits in perfectly with the theme of the song: an experience that turned out to be a dream and unreal. Nothing actually happened.


There are so many other great qualities about the song, as well. The "why don't you play the game?" vocal line, which is then mimiced by the synthesizer, is haunting. The whole song has a dreamlike quality to it too, which is a credit to the synth sounds being used, especially the synthesized vocals. But the lack of resolution is brilliant. It perfectly captures the emotion of the song.


So the next time you're listening to a popular song, don't be so quick to write it off as mindless. The techniques of great classical composers pop up every now and then in today's popular music. I knew that Daft Punk had talent just from listening to their live recordings. But they wildly exceeded my expectations with Digital Love. Every once in a while, a great popular song just may take you by surprise.