So i'm searching for a decent way to start off this review. 11+ Years of school have taught me that questions are the best openers. But I couldn't think of a good enough question to ask that has to do with this review. Um "Where Do Babies Come From?" There...
Okay. Well, now for the actual album.
Well, they also said quotes work very well. Or slogans. How about this... They say when you have sex without a condom, you are having sex with everyone your partner ever slept with. Well the same can be said about listening to Daft Punk. NO, I don't mean listening to Discovery is like having sex, well.. sorta. But what I mean is, by listening to this, you are listening to almost every song Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter have ever listened to. Their music is just that diverse... No that's lame, I'll just go with the old Year recap.
It was 2001, Timothy McVeigh Finally dies, Windows XP is released, The Ravens, Avalanche, Lakers, and D'Backs all win Championships for their Respective sports, and my second favorite album of all-time is released. WHAT A YEAR!!!
But what makes this album so great? (Yes!, there's the bread & butter question) It seems that everytime you hear about this album, it gets glowing reviews. But wait... Doesn't it have that song that goes, and I quote "One More Time. One More Time. One More Time. We're Gonna celebrate, oh yeah, alright. Don't Stop the dancin'. One More Time. We're Gonna celebrate, oh yeah, alright. Don't Stop the dancin'....." Well, yes, and to an untrained ear, while in a car on Kiis FM Daft Punk may seem a bit simple, and to an effect, they are. Lyrically that is. But lyrics are a bit overrated if you ask me. I've always liked the
Music aspect of music, i'm pretty sure that's why it's called music. Well, discovery is music to music's ears.
The one thing that is well known about this album is that the first 4 tracks are amazing on this album. Well, that's pretty weird. The 4 hits on the album were the first four tracks on the album (Released in the exact same order as the track listing). and yes, while
One More Time,
Aerodynamic,
Digital Love and
Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger are all great tracks. They tend to overshadow the rest of the album simply because they were released as singles. In actuality, any song could've been released as a single and would've been very successful. But they weren't, so I'm not going to review this as
"DISCOVERY: Containing 4 Immaculate songs, and 10 other songs" I'd like to review this entire album for the classic it is:
Instrumentals are cool, huh? Metallica put one on most of their albums and they usually ended up being the coolest song on the album. And daft punk puts 5 songs with not one word on it. Because the depth in the songs say more than any Vocoded word could.
Aerodynamic has a Guitar that belongs on some random ULTIMATE ARENA ROCK compilation, but fits just as good on a French House album. The song has a nice drum beat, cool effects, and a spacey ending, but the Guitar is the Centerpiece of the song. It's actually the least House moment on the album, but still one of the best.
Nightvision is as close to filler as you can get on this album, but it's not really skip inducing, becuase it flows inbetween 2 great songs, and it's actually kinda nice, just some short effects with a nice little melody.
Voyager is about as far from filler as you can get on this album. Containing a disco-like Bass riff throughout the song, and great pounding snares, and claps that carry take the song from relaxing to Booty-Shakeable. But the best part is easily the stunning Harp/Keyboard breakdown in the middle that alligns perfectly with the Drums and Bass. a definite highlight of the album.
Veridis Quo is one of the trippier songs on the albums, it takes a simple organ riff and showers it crazy Cerrone inspired effects that make it sound half Funeral/half Runway music. Add some nice kicks and layers, and you get a the most complex simple song ever. That may not make sense, but it's true.
Short Circuit is something that seriously, honestly sounds like something from Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo, and though some critics consider that a bad thing, let's be real, Breakin' 2 was Awesome and so was the music played in it. While most songs on this album are great for sexy, french night clubs, this is perfect for a New York Tv box to breakdance onto. But like all music, it's best on the 'Phones.
Well, maybe you HATE music, and words are much better, maybe Kicks, Riffs, and Effects bore you to tears. No need to worry, Daft Punk has you covered.
One More Time Is sung by the vocoded voice of Romanthony. And those who have heard Romanthony's work know that he doesn't need to be vocoded, yet, it still sounds perfect. Yes, Romanthony has a beautiful voice, but Vocoding it multiplies the cool of the song by a lot. The music isn't too shabby, a great drum machine and nice Brass sounding instruments make the song about way more than the Cartoon Video most of us remember it as.
Digital Love Is a very romantic and sweet song. that actually has great and touching lyrics. not to mention more great production by French Robots. And the song has a nice drum beat that goes along with the song, rather than ruining it. Because drum beats aren't usually romantic, but Daft Punk manages to find a way.
Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger is really the most Genius song on the album. 2 halves of lyrics combine to make a great verse, and not to mention the music is absolutely perfect and funky as it should be. The rhythm starts and stops with the words, before forming and building up to a highlight of the album. But the most touching song is easily
Something About Us which has the best lyrics of the album. The lyrics are sweeter and sappier than any love song you've heard. With an absolutely sexy bass, with my favorite thing in music: "Waahs" I love "Waahs", and
Something About Us has "Waah's" Galore.
While Daft Punk loves Vocoding voices, Todd Edwards was good enough to use his natural voice on
Face To Face. While the lyrics are nice and Todd has a nice voice, the Music is awesome, packed with energy, and Disco samples, and a great drumbeat.
the Final track is actually a little Cruel. It's a song that's exactly 10 Minutes and it's called "
Too Long". And it could be the best song ever, but you'd still be tempted to say
too long, what a fitting title. Ya see, because it's ten minutes.... Get it!!! it's actually a great song that makes 10 minutes seems like 2 or 3. Romanthony returns without the vocoder to show off his real voice (with the exception of a few efects here and there) and this leads to Funky snaps and soulful runs courtesy of Romanthony. and by the end of this song, the album ends, if you are like me, you start all over again from the beginning to confirm the CD you've just heard is that good. and it is, so you can do without any other albums for a few days, becuase this will not go away any time soon.
So i've covered Instrumentals, and songs with lyrics. But what if you're a tweener? What if you don't want a Voiceless song, but you don't want some lame messing up the beat with all of these crazy "
sentence" things. What if you'd like a song with just music and a looped Word or 2 from a 70's Disco song. Well, Daft Punk knows you well.
Crescendolls is basically an instrumental excluding the words "Hey" and "Everybody Y'all" but it contains the best drum beat on the album, and one of the most dancable songs on the album.
Superheroes Takes a Barry Manilow line and turns it into the Coolest thing Barry Manilow has ever been associated with (though, that isn't really saying much. Barry Manilow isn't exactly the opitimy of cool or funky) with effects and great keyboarding,
Superheroes is the albums Zenith for me.
Directly Following
superheroes is
High Life. while it probably takes the longest to enjoy out of all the songs on discovery, it ultimately is a really good song, the drumbeat is actually really good on here, but the effects are the most notable thing on
High Life
I think it was Leopold Stokowski who said "A painter paints pictures on canvas. But musicians paint their pictures on silence." If that is true, than Guy and Thomas have just Put Mona Lisa into a CD (Ok, I give up on the perfect review, none of these tactics are working. Thanks a lot, School). But on the real, Discovery is a step forward not only for House Music, but for music in general, I think some of the best music is simple music. Even a 4 year old could genuinely appreciate this album, as well as a 40 Year old Music Critic, or even a 17 year old loser with no life (Heyyyy, shut up). Though some wouldn't put it on their top 10,it is pretty much unanimous that this is one of the better albums of this decade.
