new daft punk interview archive dropped! was told i should post my transcript + making sense of the questions and answers for everyone, so here's what i've wrote! if anything is incorrect, let me know!
MuchMusic Daft Punk Interview [2001]
Interviewer: We'll start with question one, Liz, are you set?
Q: Alright- First off, we have to deal with the fact that you guys are robots. Because this is the weirdest interview set-up I've ever had, but I like it! I totally respect the fact that you guys are doing this. I just want to know, why have you become robots? And what do the helmets and masks allow you to say that you wouldn't normally say?
Thomas, visor: There was a big explosion in our studio in 1999 and we just became robots.. We don't know why but now we can write words and colorful emoticons on our faces, and we can still feel music in a good way.
Interviewer: Okay. I see how this will work. Haha! Wow, so you're still expressing. You're still.. okay. Fine. Um.
Question that goes ignored, but is said in the moment: Do you feel empowered by hiding yourself enough to be more truthful, or do you become, less?
Q: Okay, so in one of the press articles that I read, it said that British DJ Pete Tong played your new single "One More Time" for the first time and it was available immediately after that on Napster, 21 copies of this track you could download for free on the net. So what do you think about that phenomenon?
Thomas, visor: Napster definitely shows how much people like music, even though it is a threat to creation, it is at the same time a positive thing because it raises questions, the Daft Club is a positive answer to Napster.
Interviewer says "I see" and "That's not the question" as the text above scrolls.
Interviewer, about the above which was originally out of order: Okay. Are we out of order..? Um. We should just go through- why don't we do it like I'm gonna record everything of- yeah. And then go back and just do... my questions.
Interviewer: So...
Q: What role do you think the computer and the internet will play in the future of music?
Thomas, visor: The most exciting for us today is the Daft Club: here is how it works! Inside our new Discovery album, you will find a Daft Club membership card with a personal access code, and you will be able to become a member of this Daft Club for free and download additional mixes and music for free on "daftclub.com" . It is interesting and special because it is a way for us to deliver more music in a more flexible way, and it makes the CD more entertaining. It's a way to innovate and use in a creative way what internet can bring to music and art, and it can be great fun for everyone.
Interviewer: So let me just uh... Okay, you can hit the next question.
Q: So we're now in the year 2001. It's a space age imagined by people in the last century in particular- a futuristic look which looks really weird to us now, because in the 50s they thought future technology would look a certain way. Your music is being touted as being very futuristic but it has a very old feel to it. You can't really put a finger on what it reminds you of- but it feels old to me. In a past interview, you said how technology kills creativity on the dance floor and how low-tech defeats high-tech. And I really like that idea of how- in the end we're developing all these new things that bring us back to the basics. What do you appreciate about low-tech and past technologies?
Thomas, visor: We just like to combine past and future technologies, but we focus on the present, and what we like the most in music is making any technology invisible.
Interviewer: Hang on a second... Okay, you can go for the next one.
Q: In an old interview, you claimed for us that "There are flashes of very strong energy when we're doing a track. It's not like a hallucination, more like bolts and flashes of a time when we were very happy." So I'm wondering, did you guys try to consciously reach that state while making this album?
Thomas, visor: Yes, even if we wanted to in a very different way than Homework.
Interviewer: Uh, okay, and… alright- okay, next?
Q: In 1997, you said when you're upset, you cant make music, and for a lot of artists the opposite is true. Is this truth still true for you if you're upset; if you're upset you cant make good music?
Thomas, visor: [We make] music to have fun, and we [re- unknown] fun making music.
Interviewer: Okay, go.
Q: The lyrics to "Harder Better Faster Stronger" are "Work it, make it, do it, makes us, harder, better, faster, stronger." Do you think that the technology we've created makes life better for human beings? Is bigger necessarily stronger and better? And where does music in general fit into that equation? what has the money that you've made from your music given you beyond financial stability? Is this too weird-
Thomas, visor: [?]- society is just a vicious circle where progress and profit is the main value, everything must always be better, and that's sad, we spend our money creating art music and visuals and trying to break the rules of this system.
Interviewer: Is that seven [questions]? Okay. Reload? Okay.
Interviewer: Sorry about that, I didn't realize that that was the way you had done it.
Thomas, spoken: That's okay because you know, you got- you- we-we had the- freedom to-to-to do the answer, uh, you know-
Interviewer: Out of order? Yeah. It's fine.
Thomas, spoken: You have the freedom to redo the questions yourself. So it's fair in both ways.
Interviewer: To redo- Exactly. [laughs]
Thomas, spoken: We are recreating... spontaneity.
Interviewer: Is it hot in there?
Thomas, spoken: It's hot.
French babble ensues between Thomas and someone else [Pedro Winter?]
Q: So Romanthony sings on the track One More Time, and I wanted to know at what point during the recording process did you actually decide to distort his voice, because he has such a beautiful voice. When I interviewed him a year and a half ago, he mentioned that he was working on this track, so this was obviously in progress for a long time. Did you ever get frustrated or impatient about releasing this track earlier?
Thomas, visor: Romanthony's voice on One More Time was distorted from the start. The entire album took 2 years to record, it is now completed and we are releasing it now.
Q: The track 'Something About Us' is a love song - and were you guys just trying to surprise people, or explore a different, more mature side of yourselves?
Thomas, visor: Robots can be in love too...
Q: DJ Sneak helped out on the track Digital Love, and when I interviewed him he talked about having a sharing attitude about his life and he really brings people into his fold; and I want to know, what is it that you appreciate about Sneak as a person or the way that you work with him?
Thomas, visor: DJ Sneak is true friend, a loving and sharing person, and a very talented musician. Collaboration for us is about friendship.
Q: House music or disco? What's the difference to you? Is there a difference?
Thomas, visor: These are just labels invented by the system, but at the end of the day it's only music.
Q: In the past you guys have had killer videos and the images have always been really weird but they worked well with the music. These upcoming videos that you're making will be Japanese animation, and I want to know will the Japanese visuals — the Japan-ime — will the visuals have the same kind of synergy they've had with your music in the past?
Thomas, visor: The video for one more time is in Japanese animation, the visual and the audio sides mix well indeed together.
Q: Your father wrote many disco hits in the 80s. So what does he think of your new album?
Thomas, visor: He likes it very much.
Q: You're always creating hits; your side projects have been monsters. For instance, Stardust; Music Sounds Better With You. What was your intent in creating tracks outside of Daft Punk? And how does it feel when they took off as smash-hit singles?
Thomas, visor: The success of the music we do has always been a great surprise.
I: It's so weird, because you start humanizing- even though your structure is so metallic- It's just weird, because of the face and stuff-
Q: I'm doing a half-hour special about drugs and dance music. So I want to know, do you need to have drugs in order to understand dance music?
Thomas, visor: Drugs is a very serious and personal issue. We try to make the music that people can enjoy or dance to without the need of any drugs.
Q: Do you think that drugs are necessary for creativity? And at what point do drugs become dangerous?
Thomas, visor: Drugs are not necessary for creativity, they can be dangerous at any point, but every person has a different experience.
Q: And what do you think about people who do drugs in order to dance to techno or listen to electronic music when they go out?
Thomas, visor: Once again, drugs are a very serious issue that should be taken more seriously sometimes [?]
Interviewer: That's it?
[In-French verification if that was the last question or not]
Thomas, spoken: I think there was- there was the- what is this one? [He hits a button on his gauntlet]
Thomas, visor: Goodbye.
Interviewer, reading: Goodbye! Oh, I missed that one! [laughs]
Thomas, spoken: What is this one? I did another one, or so, I think- [He hits another button on his gauntlet]
Thomas, visor: Hello we are Daft Punk and you are watching MuchMusic!
Interviewer: Oh, we haven't had that one yet.
Thomas, spoken: I- t-this is an ID of something.
Interviewer: Oh! This is an ID! That's wicked! That's perfect!
Thomas, spoken: Okay- We did it- because- you know how usually- because it's really hard to re-program after.
Assorted other moments that didn't fit into the above:
Interviewer: We're doing something about the state of pop-
Thomas, spoken: You didn't do the Napster question.
[ ... ]
Thomas, spoken: Hold on, hold on...
Interviewer: There's nothing lit [on your visor] right now.
Thomas, spoken: I know that's why...
Thomas, spoken: Hang on. Actually I've got this cool animation as well. like this one- this one- oki.
[ ... ]
Interviewer: Where's your heart? [Thomas taps his chest]
[ ... ]
Thomas, spoken: You know what you could do-
[ ... ]
Guy-Man does not speak even once in this interview from what I can discern and gestures at most!
