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Daft Punk

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For The Record: Daft Punk's 'Discovery' At 20 record-daft-punk-discovery-album-20-year-anniversary

For The Record: Inside The Robotic-Pop Reinvention Of Daft Punk's 'Discovery' At 20

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Released in March 2001, 'Discovery' launched Daft Punk's robot era and perfected a widescreen sound that defined the duo right up until the end
Jack Tregoning
GRAMMYs
Mar 31, 2021 - 5:41 pm

In the run-up to the new millennium, Daft Punk transformed from shy Frenchmen into inhuman icons. The robot era, as Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo told it, began with a studio accident on September 9, 1999 that blew up their equipment and changed the essence of their being. 

As the story went, the culprit was the little-known '9999' bug, which erased all the music they'd been working on in human form. Their only choice was to carry on as androids. "I think everything was erased," Bangalter told The Face magazine in 2000 with a palpable shrug. "We had to start all over again." Details were intentionally hazy, but one thing was made clear: the robots weren't new characters or alter egos. Daft Punk was still the same Thomas and Guy-Manuel, reborn with circuit boards and chrome headgear. 

Inside Daft Punk's 'Discovery' At 20

Daft Punk's robot reinvention set the stage for their much-anticipated second album, Discovery. Released internationally in March of 2001 by Virgin Records, Discovery was a clear evolution from the duo's 1997 debut album, Homework. That record was a rough and ready riff on US house and techno with a distinctly French accent, spawning instant classics like "Da Funk", "Around The World" and "Rollin' & Scratchin'". On Discovery, Daft Punk went maximalist, bringing in '80s-tinged pop, funk and arena rock alongside a shinier house sound. 

"We didn't want in any way to do what we did on the first album," Bangalter told Big Shot in 2001. If Homework made Daft Punk into much-imitated house heroes, Discovery signaled their arrival as pop superstars, charting the duo's course for the next two decades. 

Discovery came out of an intensely creative period for Daft Punk. After releasing Homework in their early 20s, the childhood friends toured non-stop throughout 1997, playing to dark, strobe-lit rooms from behind a hardware bank. (They didn't wear masks on stage, but stayed in the shadows.) The pair began concerted work on Discovery in 1998, returning to their Paris studio crowded with drum machines, vintage keyboards, guitars and synthesizers. 

"We don't argue about who's playing what," de Homem-Christo told Mix in 2001. "You can get the sound of a guitar with a keyboard or the opposite." As well as lifting samples from dusty soul and disco records, the duo sampled their own studio jams. "We don't use too much of the sound of the instruments; it's really more about how we put effects on it after that," de Homem-Christo added. 

From 1998 into 2000, Daft Punk channeled the open-hearted passions of their childhood years, without worrying about what was cool. "When you're a child, you don't analyze music," Bangalter told Remix Mag in 2001. "You just like it because you like it." 

Daft Punk released the album’s lead single, "One More Time", in November of 2000. With producer and singer Romanthony's bright, autotuned vocals riding an exultant house melody, the song introduced Daft Punk's youthful vision. As disciples of New Jersey house and garage, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo were thrilled to meet Romanthony at the Miami Winter Music Conference in 1996. Together, they created one of Daft Punk's signature hits, which went on to earn a Best Dance Recording nomination at the 2002 GRAMMYs (the duo's third in the category, following "Da Funk" in 1998 and "Around the World" in 1999). 

The months between "One More Time" and Discovery allowed fans to obsess over Daft Punk's new appearance. The duo developed the robot design with music video directors Alex and Martin (including initial anime-inspired helmets with hair), then engaged special effects guru Tony Gardner at Alterian Inc. to make them real.

Bangalter's look was modeled on the robot Gort from 1951 sci-fi classic The Day The Earth Stood Still, while de Homem-Christo's helmet featured a vertical LED display. The design continued to evolve in the years after Discovery, leading to the reveal of the red light-up helmets atop the pyramid at Coachella in 2006. 

"We didn't want to do 15 house tracks on one album," Bangalter said of Discovery in his Big Shot interview. For all its scope and ambition, though, the album is a celebration of dance music at its heart—a feeling that's never clearer than in its first four songs, each released as a single. "One More Time" defies the cliche of the moody album opener, starting instead at warp speed. 

From there, listeners are treated to the in-your-face guitar and bells of "Aerodynamic", the doe-eyed synth-pop of "Digital Love" (co-written by Daft Punk ally DJ Sneak) and "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger", which twisted a funk riff from Edwin Birdsong's "Cola Bottle Baby" into a house steamroller. Most artists would avoid front-loading all the hoped-for hits, but Daft Punk knew they had plenty more in the tank. 

After the rush of its opening salvo, Discovery keeps switching the dial. Between the racing "Crescendolls" and thumping "Superheroes" (which sounds like a buffed and polished leftover from Homework), "Nightvision" offers an airy breather. "Something About Us"—released as the 'love theme' for Daft Punk's 2003 animated movie, Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem—sounds like a template for the cruisy vibe of the duo's fourth and final album, Random Access Memories. 

One of the album's best stretches covers the rubbery bass of "Voyager" to the Giorgio Moroder-inspired synth excursion "Veridis Quo" to the freakout funk of "Short Circuit". In this stacked middle, there's a personal favorite for every kind of Daft Punk fan. 

Daft Punk closed Discovery with two deeply-felt songs. "Face to Face" features vocals by New Jersey garage pioneer Todd Edwards, while Romanthony returns on the ten-minute closer, "Too Long". (Daft Punk namechecked both artists in a roll-call of their musical heroes on Homework cut "Teachers".) The songs are the most faithful evocations of classic house on Discovery, keeping the natural depth and clarity of both voices. 

"Their music had a big effect on us," Bangalter explained to Remix Mag of Edwards and Romanthony. "Because they mean something to us, it was much more important for us to work with them than with other big stars." Notably, Daft Punk followed Discovery with the October 2001 release of Alive 1997, featuring a live recording from their post-Homework tour. Between the warmth of "Face to Face" and "Too Long" and the raw energy of Alive 1997, the duo took care to honor the past. 

Discovery took on a new light six years later with the release of Alive 2007. The duo's second live album, recorded in Paris midway through the pyramid tour, features songs from every Daft Punk era spliced together live. In these newly adrenalized versions, familiar song elements—from the jet-fueled "Da Funk" bassline to the indelible melody of "Music Sounds Better With You" from Bangalter’s Stardust project—turn up in unexpected and thrilling ways. 

After years of rinsing Alive 2007, it can be hard to hear the original "One More Time" without expecting the burst of "Aerodynamic" guitars, or "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" without traces of "Around The World" and an arena-tooled kick-drum. While Alive 2007 makes every Daft Punk song sound like it came from the same supercharged album, we can thank Discovery for the show's tingliest moments. 

Discovery had an immediate impact on 2000s music. The album brought wider attention to the French house scene, which led Daft Punk's then-manager Pedro Winter (aka Busy P) to establish Ed Banger Records as an outlet for artists like Justice, DJ Mehdi, Cassius and Breakbot. Kanye West sampled "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" on his 2007 single "Stronger", then convinced the duo to make a cameo during his GRAMMYs performance in 2008. (Daft Punk later appeared as producers on West's searing 2013 album, Yeezus.) 

A new generation of dance acts, including Disclosure, Madeon and Porter Robinson, are indebted to Discovery. Others, like Deadmau5, took inspiration from the robot aesthetic for live shows. Following Daft Punk's "Epilogue" in February, Porter Robinson summed up his feelings in a tweet: "Thinking about how every stage of my life would have gone so differently if it weren't for Daft Punk." 

One of the most intriguing documents of the Discovery era is a promo video the duo shot in Japan. Fully outfitted in their new get-up (complete with backpacks containing their power supply), the robots pose with manga artist Leiji Matsumoto and roam the streets of Tokyo. In voiceover, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo tell the story of the album in tentative English. Their goofy dancing and natural speaking voices recall a more innocent time before Daft Punk became truly reclusive. 

"It's the first album we're making as robots," Bangalter explains over footage of the pair pranking shoppers and riding the Tokyo subway. "It's a mix between the new chip we have in our brain and the fact that we still have a heart and a heartbeat." Electronic music with a beating heart: that's the magic of Discovery. 

Tron: Legacy At 10: How Daft Punk Built An Enduring Soundtrack

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For The Record: Tiësto

Tiësto

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'In My Memory': Tiësto's Debut Album at 20 2021-for-the-record-tiesto-in-my-memory-20th-anniversary

For The Record: How Tiësto's 'In My Memory' Crowned A Dance Music Superstar 20 Years Ago

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Released 20 years ago this month, ‘In My Memory’ recalls an era when Tiësto was proudly the king of trance
Jack Tregoning
GRAMMYs
Apr 15, 2021 - 3:03 pm

Like any self-respecting star during the early 2000s, Tiësto offered up a tour DVD to the world. Released in August 2003, Another Day at the Office follows the DJ's world tour the previous year, which culminated in a New Year's Eve set at Times Square in New York. The film captures the 33-year-old on the ascent—popular enough to be flown around the world, but still able to circulate a US festival mostly incognito.

The footage captures Tiësto jumping between international flights and limos, signing t-shirts and flyers for fans and playing gigs with a bag of vinyl records and a binder of promo CDRs. "My life in general is pretty hectic," he says early in the film, framed against New York's icy East River. "On Christmas Day, I played in Ireland and London, then the day after I flew to Hong Kong, and then a day later I'm here in New York." As he lists this sleepless schedule, the smile on his face suggests he wouldn't have it any other way.

Tiësto | For The Record

Tiësto's newly hectic life coincided with the arrival of his debut album, In My Memory. Released in April of 2001 on the Black Hole Recordings sub-label Magik Muzik, the album confirmed the hotshot trance DJ's clout as a producer. Featuring the anthemic trinity of "Flight 643," "Lethal Industry" and "Suburban Train," In My Memory cemented Tiësto as the biggest name in his genre. Confirming his new status, he went on to win DJ Mag's Top 100 DJs poll for three years running from 2002 to 2004. The album also marked a distinct phase in Tiësto's production career as the new trance wunderkind before his evolution to a more polished sound on 2004's Just Be.

The DJ born Tijs Verwest was never idle in the years leading up to In My Memory. Starting out in the early '90s in his native Netherlands under the hardcore and gabber aliases DJ Limited and Da Joker, he soon broke through as DJ Tiësto. His marathon sets around Europe covered the trance spectrum, from delicate and uplifting to dark and enveloping. Early in his production career, he formed partnerships with fellow Dutch producers Ferry Corsten, as Gouryella, and Benno de Goeij, as Kamaya Painters.

As his career accelerated in the late '90s, he founded Black Hole Recordings with Arny Bink, launched the Magik and In Search of Sunrise mix series and collaborated twice with trance newcomer Armin van Buuren as Alibi and Major League.

In the late '90s, Tiësto also became known as a prolific remixer for BT, Signum and Balearic Bill. However his true breakout came in 2000 with the "In Search Of Sunrise Remix" of Delirium's "Silence," featuring Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan. Tiësto spent three weeks getting his version just right. "Everything has to be perfect or [McLachlan] doesn't approve," he told Canada's bpm:tv in 2001. After his take on "Silence" blew up, Tiësto put a pause on remixing to focus on his debut album.

Tiësto worked on the tracks for In My Memory at the Black Hole Recordings studio in his hometown of Breda. "Lethal Industry" was already a mainstay of his sets in 1999, guaranteeing its spot on the tracklist. (Tiësto's other big tune of that year, "Sparkles," was featured in the Ibiza-set comedy movie, Kevin & Perry Go Large.)

While the album promised purist, club-ready trance, Tiësto set out to showcase different shades to his sound with the help of British vocalists Kirsten Hawkshaw, Nicola Hitchcock and Jan Johnston. The DJ then created the Magik Musik sub-label in 2001 as a home for the album, while also finding time to put out a pair of mix compilations, Magik Seven: Live In Los Angeles and the double-disc Revolution.

Tiësto structured In My Memory as a journey towards the sure-fire trio of "Flight 643," "Lethal Industry" and "Suburban Train." Album opener "Magik Journey" expands on the classical work of Tiësto's collaborator Geert Huinink, with swelling strings and ghostly vocals driving to an explosive conclusion. The same drawn-out energy returns on "Obsession," a collaboration with Dutch producer Junkie XL, now best known for scoring Hollywood blockbusters like Mad Max: Fury Road and Deadpool.

Working together in Junkie XL's underground cellar in Amsterdam, the pair produced the ideal nine-minute track for an all-night Tiësto set. (On his YouTube channel, Junkie XL recalled taking the "obsession" soundbite from a Calvin Klein ad on TV: "The beautiful thing about the [year] 2000 is you'd get away with things you'd never get away with now.")

Not all the tracks on In My Memory floored the accelerator. The warm pads of "Close To You," featuring seasoned trance vocalist Jan Johnston, evokes a hazy Ibiza sunrise, while the instrumental "Dallas 4PM" finds Tiësto in expansive progressive trance mode. Title track "In My Memory" features Nicola Hitchcock's brittle vocals over a radiant melody, while the trip-hop-influenced "Battleship Grey," featuring Kirsty Hawkshaw, is the album's most surprising deviation.

The album saves its biggest hitters for last. "Flight 643", named after the non-stop service between Amsterdam and New York, is built around an unmistakable synth stab that never lets up. Following the propulsive tech-trance of "Lethal Industry," the album closes with "Suburban Train," which builds steadily over ten minutes to all-out euphoria.

The composition draws heavily on "Re-Form," a 2000 track by Dutch producer Kid Vicious (that Tiësto also remixed). While "Suburban Train" became a staple of Tiësto's sets for years to come, he occasionally reached for the vocal version featuring Kirsty Hawkshaw, "Urban Train."

In My Memory ensured Tiësto rarely slept in his own bed. In addition to his residency for Cream at Amnesia in Ibiza, he ticked off early editions of Ultra Music Festival and Coachella in 2002. That summer, Moby booked Tiësto for his Area2 festival tour of the US, which features prominently in Another Day at the Office. With trance at the peak of its popularity in 2003 (led largely by Dutch talent), Tiësto drew 25,000 fans to the Gelredome in The Netherlands for an eight-hour set captured on the Tiësto In Concert DVD.

Despite his good fortunes, Tiësto was wary of being labeled as just a trance guy. "I am definitely a trance DJ, but I try to bring people into trance," he said backstage at the Global Gathering festival in 2002. "I think of it as a journey, and in that journey, I visit the warm and harder stuff, and different kinds of music."

In his 2001 interview with bpm.tv, he shrugged off the suggestion that he was moving to a more progressive style. "I got a little bit bored about all the same epic stuff that's coming out," he reasoned. "I just like to play music from the heart, that has some sensitive elements and some powerful energy."

That wariness of being pigeonholed informed Tiësto's vocal-heavy but still trance-focused 2007 album, Elements Of Life, which earned his first nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the GRAMMYs. In 2009, his new label Musical Freedom and electro-pop album Kaleidoscope clearly signaled a new era.

As the EDM boom took over the US in the early 2010s, Tiësto's sets moved towards big-room electro-house, which in turn attracted a new audience. "I think some of the old trance guys still have their following, but it doesn't feel like anyone really cares," he told DJ Mag plainly in 2014. While the occasional trance classic still turns up in his sets, the sound of In My Memory is firmly in Tiësto's past.

In Another Day at the Office, Tiësto describes the pay-off for his punishing work hours. "I love what I do," he says simply. "It's still my hobby. When I DJ, I love it." Two decades later, after thousands of shows and a few musical evolutions, the hobby is still paying off.

For The Record: How The Fugees Settled 'The Score' 25 Years Ago

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A girl looks at a photograph of Ewan McGregor who played Renton in the film 'Trainspotting' before the Private view for ?Look At Me - A Retrospective?

Photo of Ewan McGregor in Trainspotting

 

Photo: Chris Jackson/Getty Images

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Revisiting The 'Trainspotting' Soundtrack At 25 trainspotting-film-soundtrack-anniversary

How The 'Trainspotting' Soundtrack Turned A Dispatch From The Fringes Into A Cult Classic

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Twenty-five years after 'Trainspotting' first thrilled and scandalized moviegoers, the film's soundtrack remains an iconic collision of Britpop, rock and dance music
Jack Tregoning
GRAMMYs
Feb 28, 2021 - 3:43 pm

From its opening shot, Trainspotting is a movie in motion. As sneakers hit the sidewalk of Princes Street in Edinburgh, Scotland, we hear the raucous drumbeat of Iggy Pop's 1977 barnstormer "Lust For Life." Renton—played by Ewan McGregor—and Spud—by Ewen Bremner—sprint away from two security guards, their shoplifting spoils flying out of their pockets. 

"Choose life," Renton's narration begins, introducing an instantly classic monologue about the emptiness of middle-class aspirations. The action then zips to a soccer match that introduces Renton's ragtag mates: Spud, Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), Begbie (Robert Carlyle) and Tommy (Kevin McKidd). The scene is all propulsion and attitude, with Iggy Pop dropping the match on the trail of fuel. In just 60 exhilarating seconds, Trainspotting tells us precisely what it's going to be.

Trainspotting burst into U.K. cinemas in February 1996, followed immediately by a debate on whether its fizzing depiction of junkie life glorified drug use. Audiences staggered out, scandalized and delighted in equal measure by "The Worst Toilet In Scotland," Spud's soiled sheets and a ceiling-crawling baby. By the time it opened in the US in May, the movie was already a critical and box office hit at home. Its credentials were undeniable, including a compelling young cast led by newcomer McGregor, a visually daring director in Danny Boyle and a script adapted from Irvine Welsh's cult book of the same name. 

In a year dominated by slick Hollywood blockbusters like Independence Day, Twister and Mission: Impossible, Trainspotting was the scrappy, no-kids-allowed outsider that could. One of the movie's most significant talking points, and a key reason for its enduring legacy, was its use of "needle drops" in lieu of a traditional composerly film score. The soundtrack reaches back to the '70s and '80s, while also showcasing of-the-moment Britpop and dance music. The music of Trainspotting endures because it's intrinsic to the movie, with each song meant to elevate a particular scene or moment. 

Read: How 1995 Became The Year Dance Music Albums Came Of Age

Welsh's 1993 novel frames Renton's misadventures as a heroin addict against the dismal backdrop of Leith, just north of Edinburgh's city center. Trainspotting was first adapted as a stage play, with Ewen Bremner (perfectly cast as Spud in the movie) playing Renton. Before long, the movie offers rolled in. "There was loads of interest," Welsh told Vice in 2016. "Everybody seemed to want to make a film of Trainspotting."

Most directors wanted to ground the adaptation in social realism, but Welsh knew Trainspotting needed a wilder take. In 1994, a promising young director called Danny Boyle had made his feature debut with the pitch-black comedy Shallow Grave, starring Ewan McGregor. Impressed by the movie's visual flair, Welsh gave Boyle the keys to Trainspotting. 

The making of the movie was a thrill for all involved. Fresh from writing Shallow Grave, screenwriter John Hodge relished the opportunity to adapt Welsh's book for the screen. (Hodge was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay at the 1997 Academy Awards - the movie's only Oscar nod.) Before filming, Boyle sent his actors to spend time with Calton Athletic, a real-life recovery group for addicts. The shoot began in June 1995 and lasted 35 days (a step up from the 30 allocated for Shallow Grave), with Glasgow mostly standing in for Edinburgh. 

Alongside cinematographer Brian Tufano, Boyle brought a bold, kinetic style to every shot. "We'd set out to make as pleasurable a film as possible about subject matter that is almost unwatchable," Boyle told HiBrow in 2018. 

While Shallow Grave gave an early glimpse of Boyle's tastes, including his fondness for electronic duo Leftfield, the music in Trainspotting demanded a bigger role. Welsh's book is peppered with references to The Smiths, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed and David Bowie, so the call went out to a select list of musical icons. Bowie was a no, but others who'd loved the novel happily offered up their music to the project. 

Welsh and Boyle were both clued-in to acid house and rave culture (represented on the soundtrack by the likes of Underworld, Leftfield and John Digweed and Nick Muir's Bedrock project), but it was the director's idea to bring in the likes of Blur and Pulp. That decision was a "masterstroke", Welsh told Vice, because "Britpop was kind of the last strand of British youth culture, and it helped position the film as being the last movie of British youth culture."

Several of the best scenes in Trainspotting are soundtracked by songs made before 1990. Following "Lust For Life", the sleazy strut of Iggy Pop's 1977 track "Nightclubbing" lurks behind a sequence of Renton's relapse into heroin. (Both songs were co-written by David Bowie, giving him an honorary spot on the soundtrack.) New Order's 1981 song "Temptation" is a motif for Renton's taboo relationship with high schooler Diane (Kelly Macdonald in her first film role), while Heaven 17's 1983 pop hit "Temptation" plays at the club where they first meet. 

Lou Reed's "Perfect Day" lands the hardest punch. In a dazzling sequence, Renton visits his dealer Mother Superior (Peter Mullan) for a hit of heroin. As Renton's body sinks almost romantically into the floor, we hear Lou Reed softly singing about a perfect day drinking sangria in the park. The romance ends there. Knowing an overdose on sight, Mother Superior drags his sort-of friend to the street, then heaves him into a taxi, tucking the fare in his shirt pocket. (In a brilliant small detail, we see an ambulance rush past, headed for someone else.) 

"Perfect Day" keeps on at its languid pace as Renton is ejected at the hospital, hauled onto a stretcher and revived by a nurse with a needle to his arm. "You're going to reap just what you sow," Lou Reed sings as Renton gasps wildly for air. 

Boyle pushed for Britpop on the soundtrack, but he didn't want obvious hits. Britpop, a genre coined in the '90s to describe a new wave of British bands influenced by everything from the Beatles to the late '80s "Madchester" scene, was at its peak during the Trainspotting shoot in the summer of 1995. Pulp had just released the Britpop anthem "Common People," Elastica and Supergrass were flying high from their debut albums, and genre superstars Oasis and Blur were locked in a media-fueled battle for chart supremacy. 

In the heat of all that hype, Boyle reached back to 1991 and took "Sing" from Blur's debut album, Leisure. The song's stirring piano melody picks up after the "Nightclubbing" sequence, as Renton and his fellow addicts hit a harrowing rock bottom. Later, when Begbie busts in on Renton's new life in London, Pulp's "Mile End" underlines the mood of big city ennui. Along with contributions from Elastica and Blur frontman Damon Albarn, Trainspotting draws on just enough Britpop to keep its cool. 

If Trainspotting has a signature song, it's Underworld's "Born Slippy .NUXX". The duo of Rick Smith and Karl Hyde already had three albums behind them when Boyle reached out to use their 1995 B-side in his movie's climax. The duo was wary—as Smith later put it to Noisey, their music was often sought out to accompany "a scene of mayhem"—but Boyle convinced them with a snippet of the film. Underworld also contributed the propulsive "Dark & Long" to the indelible scene of Renton detoxing inside his childhood bedroom. After Trainspotting, "Born Slippy .NUXX" became the defining song of Underworld's career and a constant euphoric peak in their live sets. 

Just as Trainspotting caught the Britpop zeitgeist, it also immortalized a high point for dance music. A rush of trailblazing dance albums came out in 1995, including Leftfield's Leftism, The Chemical Brothers' Exit Planet Dust and Goldie's Timeless. In a time of rave culture colliding with chart hits, the movie finds room for both the dark electronics of Leftfield's "A Final Hit" and the goofy Eurodance of Ice MC's "Think About The Way". 

In one scene, Renton sits grinning between the speakers at a London nightclub that's going off to Bedrock and KYO's 1993 classic "For What You Dream Of." "Diane was right," he narrates, recalling a conversation from before he left Edinburgh. "The world is changing, music is changing, drugs are changing, even men and women are changing." For the briefest moment, we see the thrill of '90s dance music as it really was. 

The Trainspotting soundtrack album hit shelves in July of 1996. The cover played on the movie's iconic poster design, framing the characters in vivid orange. The soundtrack sold so well that a second volume followed in 1997, featuring other songs from the movie and a few that missed the cut. (The same year, the hugely popular Romeo + Juliet soundtrack also inspired a "Vol. 2.") 

Boyle continued to use music as a key character in his movies, following up Trainspotting with the madcap Americana of A Life Less Ordinary and the pop-meets-electronica of The Beach. After 20 years, Boyle got the gang back together for 2017's T2 Trainspotting. In contrast to the original's wall-to-wall needle drops, the sequel weaved a score by Underworld's Rick Smith around songs by High Contrast, Wolf Alice and Young Fathers. 

Many impressive, star-studded soundtracks followed in the wake of Trainspotting. What makes this one rare, though, is how deeply its unholy union of rock, Britpop and dance music belongs to the movie. Remove any needle drop from a scene in Trainspotting, however fleeting, and it'd lose something vital—that's how you know it's built to last.

How 1995 Became A Blockbuster Year For Movie Soundtracks

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The Chemical Brothers perform live in 1995

The Chemical Brothers perform live in 1995

Photo: Mick Hutson/Redferns

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How 1995 Changed Dance Music's Album Game 1995-dance-music-albums-electronic-edm

How 1995 Became The Year Dance Music Albums Came Of Age

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In the mid-'90s, then-scrappy acts like The Chemical Brothers, Leftfield, Goldie and Aphex Twin released landmark albums, upending misconceptions about electronic music and setting the standard for a new dance generation
Jack Tregoning
GRAMMYs
Jul 19, 2020 - 7:00 am

Back in 1995, years before the rise of Coachella, Lollapalooza was the U.S. festival to beat. Founded in 1991 by Jane's Addiction frontman Perry Farrell, the multi-city roadshow quickly became a peak summer institution. 

Lollapalooza's 1995 lineup featured alt-rock royalty like Sonic Youth, Pavement and The Jesus Lizard alongside artists as diverse as Beck, Cypress Hill, Sinead O'Connor and Hole. For all its genre-hopping, though, the festival largely missed one sound close to its founder's heart: electronic music. Even Moby, the former punk and sole raver on the bill, turned up with a guitar and his best rock snarl. 

Across the Atlantic, iconic U.K. festival Glastonbury took an alternative view on 1995: In its universe, electronic music was on the ascent. For the first time in Glastonbury's then-25-year history, the festival introduced a Dance Tent, which featured trip-hop collective Massive Attack alongside homegrown DJs Carl Cox, Spooky and Darren Emerson. 

Elsewhere, from the main stage to the Jazz World stage, Glastonbury lined up the best and brightest of U.K.-made electronic music: The Prodigy, Portishead, Tricky, Goldie and Orbital among them. That June weekend, a musical movement coalesced on a farm in the English countryside. 

One year prior, The Prodigy's Music For The Jilted Generation lit the fuse on the momentum to come. Released in July 1994, the album was an immediate outlier in a golden age of alternative rock. Soundgarden, Green Day, Pearl Jam and Nine Inch Nails loomed large Stateside, while in the U.K., Blur's Parklife and Oasis' Definitely Maybe battled for Britpop supremacy. Liam Howlett, The Prodigy's beatmaker-in-chief, came from a different world. Music For The Jilted Generation cut the grit and aggression of punk rock with the ecstatic highs of raving, producing indelible anthems like "Their Law" and "No Good (Start The Dance)." The album topped the charts in the U.K., but it failed to break through in the U.S. 

By the next year, a varied cast of then-newcomers was ready to make its mark. Not all fit The Prodigy's fast and furious mold. The crop of albums released in 1995, including several remarkable debuts, showcased the many moods, textures and possibilities in electronic music. The year brought legitimacy and studio polish to the format, while also sparking an era of intense, analog-heavy live shows. 

Released in January 1995, Leftfield's Leftism reached for a more transcendent plane than the rave anthems of the day. "At the time, a lot of people thought dance music was this fake thing," Neil Barnes, one half of the duo, alongside Paul Daley, told The Guardian in 2017. "[Leftism] came out in the middle of Britpop, which we didn't really understand." 

Leftfield called on surprising voices, including Toni Halliday of alt-rock group Curve and The Sex Pistols frontman John Lydon, to challenge the demarcation of dance music. While the album was nominally "progressive house," its songs channeled the thrum of London through dub, reggae and pop hooks. Over two decades later, Leftism remains thrillingly true to its time and place.

Across the country from Liam Howlett's Essex studio, Bristol natives Massive Attack had their own designs on the jilted generation. Where The Prodigy raged, Massive Attack seethed. Like Leftfield's Leftism, Massive Attack's Blue Lines (1991) and Protection (1994) drew on dub, reggae and soul, arriving not at house music, but at the slow creep of Bristol's signature trip-hop sound. Protection collaborator Tricky broke through in 1995 with his own trip-hop masterpiece, Maxinquaye; its opener, "Overcome," is an alternative version of Protection cut "Karmacoma." Björk, a then-recent '90s transplant to the U.K. from Iceland, also called on Bristol connections for her startling second album, Post (1995).

Read: 'Post' at 25: How Björk Brought Her Ageless Sophomore Album To Life

Meanwhile, in London, motor-mouthed DJ/producer Goldie emerged from the basement clubs with a fully realized debut album. Released in July 1995, Timeless exemplified the drum & bass genre in LP form, stretching from deep and sonorous atmospherics to heads-down jungle roll-outs. Audacious to a fault, Goldie packaged his star-making single, "Inner City Life," inside a 21-minute opening track. (The opener on his next album, 1998's Saturnz Return, runs an hour long.) Grounded by vocals throughout from the late Diane Charlemagne, Timeless brought widescreen validation to an underground culture. Recognized as a key moment in dance music history by The Guardian, the album became a surprise Top 10 hit in the U.K. "Timeless was a f*cking good blueprint," the producer told Computer Music in 2017. "There were ten years of my life in that album." 

The mid-'90s also introduced one of the dominant dance headliners of the next 25 years, sharing a tier with The Prodigy and two French upstarts called Daft Punk—that is, if Daft Punk played the festival game. 

After a couple of releases as The Dust Brothers, including the propulsive steamrollers "Chemical Beats" and "Song To The Siren," Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons became The Chemical Brothers with 1995's Exit Planet Dust. (The Dust Brothers name already belonged to a songwriting/production team out of Los Angeles.) 

Exit Planet Dust contains none of the reticence you might expect from a debut album. Right from the sleazy chug of opener "Leave Home," it's a dance record with classic rock heft. Even the hippieish cover art, lifted from a 1970s fashion shoot, references a world beyond the rave. (A favorite of early fans, Exit Planet Dust set the stage for the true breakout of 1997's Dig Your Own Hole, which featured the group's career-defining single, "Block Rockin' Beats.")

Crucially, "Chemical Beats" and "Song To The Siren" put The Chemical Brothers on lineups alongside fellow gear geeks Underworld, Leftfield and Orbital. Each act brought a version of their studio hardware to the stage, working the synthesizers, drum machines and mixing consoles under the cover of darkness.

This period of live innovation dovetailed with the superstar DJ phenomenon, ushered in by landmark mix albums like Sasha & Digweed's Northern Exposure (1996) and Paul Oakenfold's Tranceport (1998). A new rank of DJs, predominantly British and male, commanded skyrocketing fees, foreshadowing the excesses of America's own EDM boom more than a decade later. In the run-up to the 2000s, DJs and live acts struck a sometimes-uneven alliance. Fast-forward to Miami's dance massive Ultra Music Festival in the 2010s: DJs represented the main stage status quo, with live acts neatly billed in their own amphitheater.

In the pre-Facebook days of the mid-'90s, dance stars turned to magazines to vent or cause mischief. Aphex Twin, who released his bracing third album, …I Care Because You Do, in 1995, enjoyed derailing interviewers with fanciful responses. Goldie took the opposite approach, talking on and on without a filter. Ed Simons of The Chemical Brothers, on the other hand, got right to the point. 

"I'm amazed at the low expectations which have always been centered on dance music," Simons told Muzik Magazine in 1995. In the same interview, he rankled at the critique that his music lacks soul: "Not everyone wants to be like Portishead, making music for people to put on when they have little dinner parties." (Later, in a 1997 Paper profile, Björk mocked America's adoption of The Chemical Brothers as electronic saviors: "The Chemical Brothers are hard rock!")

In the U.S., the top-selling album of 1995 was Hootie & The Blowfish's Cracked Rear View, ahead of the likes of Mariah Carey's Daydream, 2Pac's Me Against The World and The Lion King soundtrack. 

Alanis Morissette's Jagged Little Pill went on to win big at the 1996 GRAMMYs, picking up the Album Of The Year award. For now, dance acts were left watching the party from the kids' table. (The GRAMMYS would later introduce the Best Dance Recording category in 1998.)

By 1997, dance music's outsider reputation was starting to shift, thanks in large part to the streak of groundbreaking albums two years prior. The Prodigy, previously overlooked in the U.S., sparked a label bidding war for its third album, The Fat Of The Land; Madonna's boutique imprint, Maverick Records, won out. Propelled by a polished big beat sound and the introduction of livewire hype man Keith Flint, The Fat Of The Land went to No. 1 in the States. That year, the floodgates opened, delivering Daft Punk's Homework, The Chemical Brothers' Dig Your Own Hole and Aphex Twin's still-creepy Come To Daddy EP. 

Lollapalooza's 1997 lineup, in turn, looked a lot different from its 1995 run. This time, founder Perry Farrell brought electronic music to the fore. The change-up had mixed results: Attendance overall was down, The Prodigy protested the venue choices, Orbital and fellow U.K. beatmakers The Orb had to follow Tool, and Tricky felt askew sharing a main stage with Korn. But Lollapalooza's gamble signaled changing times. 

Coachella debuted in 1999 with The Chemical Brothers, Underworld and Moby among the headliners. Like Glastonbury before it, the new desert festival even had a dedicated dance tent: the Sahara stage. At last, the underdog genre of 1995 had stepped into the light.

How Will Coronavirus Shift Electronic Music? Maceo Plex, Paul Van Dyk, Luttrell, Mikey Lion & DJ Manager Max Leader Weigh In

Daft Punk at the world premiere of 'TRON: Legacy' in 2010

Daft Punk at the world premiere of 'TRON: Legacy' in 2010

Photo: Alberto E. Rodriguez/WireImage

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Daft Punk's 'Tron: Legacy' At 10 daft-punk-tron-legacy-10-year-anniversary

'Tron: Legacy' At 10: How Daft Punk Built An Enduring Soundtrack

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Released December 3, 2010, the soundtrack album pushed Daft Punk's music to new, exciting places and underscored the duo's prowess with live instrumentation
Gabriel Aikins
GRAMMYs
Dec 6, 2020 - 12:57 pm

In December 2010, The Walt Disney Company took a chance—the kind only a business can take when they're the most powerful entertainment conglomerate in the world. They took Tron—a 1982 film about the world and programs living inside computers that enjoyed a dedicated, if small, cult following—and gave it a sequel. Tron: Legacy brought back original star Jeff Bridges, alongside fresh faces Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde, to revisit the film's computer world of "The Grid" with the help of some much-updated digital effects. 

As a film, Tron: Legacy was a mixed bag at the time, earning a modest, by Disney's standards, $400 million over its theatrical run. The movie garnered praise for its impressive visuals, while drawing criticism toward some questionable acting—and even more questionable de-aging effects on Bridges. Ten years on, many aspects of Tron: Legacy hold up quite well, especially its soundtrack, composed by none other than French electronic music duo, Daft Punk. 

By 2010, Daft Punk were already legends in the electronic music community. The duo, composed of producers Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, had three studio albums under the belt across a career that was nearing its second decade by then, but each release showcased the meticulous genius of their craft. So, too, was their artist persona well-set, with their signature robotic helmets and gloves and their aversion to interviews combining to craft an enigmatic aura around them that only heightened their mythical status. 

One only needs to look at the singles the group charted throughout the decades to understand the vast breadth of Daft Punk's skill and musical knowledge. "Da Funk," off their 1997 debut album, Homework, naturally draws from the groovy basslines and percussions of funk. The shimmering "Face To Face," off Discovery (2001), incorporates disco into the mix, and the undeniable "One More Time," from the same album, mashes sampled horns, jubilant dance music rhythms and French house music into a track that remains a foundational piece of electronic music in the 21st century. 

Even with that amount of range and expertise, it was no sure thing from either side to have Daft Punk compose the film's soundtrack. In one of the few interviews the duo gave about Tron: Legacy, Bangalter told The Hollywood Reporter that director Joe Kosinski had reached out to them all the way back in 2007, with no script in hand to reference. "We were on tour at that time, and it took almost a year to decide whether we had the desire and the energy to dive into something like that," Bangalter recalled. 

As well, there was initial hesitation from Disney to give the duo free rein. Another interview with the Los Angeles Times revealed that the original plan was to pair Daft Punk with a much more traditional and established film composer like Hans Zimmer. Instead, the final product saw Daft Punk forging ahead largely on their own, and the results speak for themselves.

A conversation about the artistry within the Tron: Legacy soundtrack has to mention the original 1982 Tron soundtrack. Composed by Wendy Carlos, a pioneering electronic musician and composer, it planted the seeds for Daft Punk. While the original soundtrack is largely a traditional symphonic score, Carlos did incorporate synths where she could, like on mid-movie track, "Tron Scherzo." Even where she didn't, the physical instruments mirrored the chimes and notifications of a computer system, as in the intro to "Water, Music, and Tronaction." Daft Punk took these concepts and ran with them.

It's evident from the intro of Tron: Legacy's "Overture" how the duo innately understands the sounds they're working with and how they operate within the world of Tron. Instead of drawing from French house or club music, they pull from the sounds of an actual computer. The low thrum in the opening seconds sounds like a system booting up, and the lone horn delivering the main melodic line instantly connects this soundtrack with the original. The duo told the Los Angeles Times that the original film captivated them, and these direct links back to it prove they did their homework. 

Read: 20 Years Ago, 'O Brother, Where Art Thou?' Crashed The Country Music Party

Each track Daft Punk created stands on its own without the film. The cascading synth building with a sense of urgency on "Son Of Flynn" is prime Daft Punk in its understanding of tempo and musical momentum. "Derezzed," played in the film's neon club scene—in which the duo make a blink-and-you-miss-it cameo as the DJs—is an electronic dance track through and through. "Adagio For Tron" is a moving, sorrowful ode to a fallen hero, with a minor key and just a hint of a synth beat under the orchestral rise.

Altogether, the production across the soundtrack is topnotch. Moments like the live percussion blending into the synths in "The Game Has Changed" show a great understanding of both film scoring as well as the concept of bridging technology and humanity, a central theme in the film.

Much of Daft Punk's approach to Tron: Legacy is rooted in a darker, more ominous sound, which is a major reason why the soundtrack and the movie both still resonate today: They're decidedly more cynical and pessimistic than the original. Tron arrived at the dawn of widespread home computing, and both the film and its soundtrack embody the optimism of what technology could do for the average person. In 2010, things were vastly different. Mass data collection, security hacks and stolen information, social media toxicity, and disinformation spread were the name of the game; it's only gotten worse over time. 

Consequently, Tron: Legacy is cynical in its view and appropriately more sinister in its aesthetic, an approach Daft Punk heightened with their soundtrack. "Rinzler," the theme for one of the film's main villains, drips with menace from its abrasive percussion and moody synths. Even "Flynn Lives" and "Finale," two of the tracks at the end of the movie where the heroes emerge triumphantly, are more subdued than a typical climactic piece, with horns that fade quickly and quiet string sections taking their place.

2010 was a high-water mark for popular artists stepping into film music, with Daft Punk's Tron: Legacy soundtrack and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross' The Social Network score dropping in the same year. Still, the influence has been felt periodically on film scores since. Sucker Punch (2011) leaned heavily into dance and electronica in its cover album soundtrack, and Arcade Fire provided a futuristic tilt to Her (2013). For its part, Disney clearly learned the right lesson when it came to pairing a visionary film with an equally visionary artist: On the Black Panther soundtrack album (2018), Kendrick Lamar married his music with the film's fictional world of Wakanda, an approach extremely similar to what Daft Punk created on Tron: Legacy.

Read: Daft Punk, 'Random Access Memories': For The Record

Daft Punk, too, learned some things they took to heart. The integration of more live instrumentation within their production, an understanding and homage of music that came before, and the challenge to explore new genres resulted in something truly special: the duo's 2013 album, Random Access Memories. It's a disco album that switched gears heavily to include more live instruments than Bangalter and de Homem-Christo had ever used in their own material before, and included direct tributes to electronic music legends like Giorgio Moroder. (The duo's magnum opus, Random Access Memories won the coveted Album Of The Year honor at the 56th GRAMMY Awards in 2014.) And each of these new elements can be traced to the work they started on Tron: Legacy.

It's fitting that Tron: Legacy and its soundtrack released in December. The cold winter matches the darkness of The Grid and the tired cynicism of what technology can achieve. But December is also so close to the start of a new year, to the hope of something different and to the promise to do more and to do better. On Tron: Legacy, Daft Punk reached deep into their knowledge to push their music to new, exciting places. It still endures as a testament to their craft 10 years later.

How 1995 Became A Blockbuster Year For Movie Soundtracks

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