Some Early Thoughts on RANDOM ACCESS MEMORIES.
discopotential: First of all, the stream available from iTunes is only 192kbps. We’re not giving the record a full assessment until we can hear it loudly at 320kbps or directly from CD or vinyl. (We can tell because we are terrible people who are snobs about sound quality.)
Secondly, a lot of the commentary we’re seeing seems to be from people who expected Daft Punk to make an album that wasn’t this one, despite months of interviews and discussions where they specifically cited yacht rock and disco as the primary influences on Random Access Memories. Guys, they made the album they said they were going to make. If you expected Discovery II, you were going to be disappointed from the outset. We don’t really feel that badly for you, bro.
Finally (and related to the second item), we think the duo is more interested in songwriting and craft than making an entirely new sound. Maybe it’s because of the way dance culture works; as a “scene,” we’re always more responsive to something that’s a technical advancement versus a nicely-put-together example of the form.
