Yesterday was Daft Punk Day on the internet as Random Access Memories finally hit the world wide web. It seemed as if everyone needed to make sure to get their two cents in whether they liked the album or just wanted to get it out there that they felt the album was all hype and no substance.
Connecticut’s the Stepkids got in on Daft Punk Day by releasing a jazzy cover of Random Access Memories’ first single – Get Lucky. The trio’s interpretation is incredibly smooth, but not in a cheesy Kenny G. type of way. We especially like the harmonies. Check it out…
After months of anticipation French dance titans Daft Punk finally released their new single, Get Lucky, on Friday. It didn’t take long for the song to make an impression as it set a Spotify record for streams within 24 hours and just one day after its release, Umphrey’s McGee took a stab at the song.
UM delivered their version of Get Lucky in the second set of last night’s show at Stubb’s BBQ in Austin, Texas. Drummer Kris Myers handled vocals on the Daft Punk cover. The Chicago-based sextet worked through two long song sandwiches in Austin as they fit four tunes in the middle of Utopian Fir during the first set and started and ended the second set with JaJunk.
While many are chomping at the bit to hear the new Daft Punk album, we were more excited to see the band live. The French duo’s Alive 2007 Tour was the stuff of legend thanks to the relentless sonic assault and mind-blowing pyramid staging they brought to each show. Unfortunately it looks like we’ll have to wait to see Daft Punk in concert as the pair told Rolling Stone that they don’t have any plans to tour behind the soon-to-be-released Random Access Memories.
Here’s what DP’s Thomas Bangalter had to say about touring to RS’s Jonah Weiner…
“we have no current plans” to tour the new record. “We want to focus everything on the act and excitement of listening to the album. We don’t see a tour as an accessory to an album.” When they do finally hit the road, he added, it will be with a career-encompassing set list, not one overly focused on the new material.
Thankfully Bangalter has left the door open for a tour, it just sounds like it won’t be anytime soon. Now, that doesn’t mean the pair won’t make appearances to promote the album and we bet there will be plenty of those in the near future. But as with everything in the world of Daft Punk, any potential appearances are shrouded in secrecy and for every one performance they actually make, we bet we’ll see dozens of blog posts about ones that don’t wind up happening.
Last night at Coachella, festivalgoers were shocked to find a trailer for Random Access Memories playing on the big screens around the Polo Grounds. In the clip we get to hear more of Daft Punk’s new single, Get Lucky, and are treated to a list of collaborators that includes The Strokes lead singer Julian Casablancas, Pharrell Williams and Panda Bear of Animal Collective. Take a look…
One of the most anticipated albums of 2013 has to be Daft Punk’s fourth studio LP – Random Access Memories. The album is set to drop next month and features collaborations with singer-songwriter Paul Williams, Chic’s Nile Rodgers and famed disco producer Giorgio Moroder. To help promote the album, Daft Punk is offering a series of videos that take a look at the album’s collaborators.
The first episode of The Collaborators has been posted featuring a chat with Giorgio Moroder in which the Italian producer talks about his first exposure to Daft Punk, his work with Donna Summer and his work with Daft Punk on the new LP…
Earlier this month Daft Punk used Saturday Night Live to debut a 15-second snippet of their new studio album and apparently that went well for the French EDM masters as they unveiled another 15-second segment of the LP during last night’s episode of SNL. The new ad directs viewers to iTunes where they can pre-order Random Access Memories which is due on May 21st.
We’re still awaiting track titles, but we think it’s safe to say the song featured in the SNL commercial is called “Get Lucky.” This funky disco-fied snippet has us thirsty for more. Check it out…
Saturday Night Live is usually notable for its fake commercials, not real ones, yet tonight’s episode featured a super-quick Daft Punk teaser/commercial. All we got to see was a brief look at the logo and helmet insignia the French EDM masters used to announce their 3-album deal with Columbia Records.
Daft Punk’s fourth album is expected this spring. You can watch the commercial here…
The same Daft Punk ad aired a second time during last night’s episode of Saturday Night Live.
Back on Tuesday, while the rest of the blogosphere was pimping the Daft Punk, Phoenix and Yeah Yeah Yeahs at Coachella story, we explained the problem with the source of the story – a Songkick email. Today, Songkick has posted a blog entry that goes into detail about just what happened. In short, the data was not a leak and did not come from anyone connected with the festival.
As we warned, anybody could’ve added the bunk info into Songkick’s system and if it wasn’t caught before email notifications went out, this bad data makes its way to many Songkick users.
Here’s the company’s explanation…
When bad data like this is added to Songkick, we remove it as swiftly as possible to avoid any confusion or rumours spreading. In this case, the information was added in the early hours of Saturday morning UK time – thankfully, one of our moderators in the US caught the false listing and removed it within a few hours of it being added. However, in the short space of time that it was live on the site, some email notifications were sent out. A screenshot of one of the emails was widely spread around the blogosphere and Twitter, and then picked up by the larger news sites. Unfortunately, it was seen to be a rumour and snowballed from there.
This wasn’t the first time Songkick’s system was gamed and apparently it’s been happening frequently since DaftEllaGate…
We’re approaching the part of the year when many major music festivals reveal their lineup. Before these reveals, music blogs and message board users do their best to figure out who’s playing where before the official announcements. Sometimes this excitement leads to the spreading of false information such as the many sites that reported Prince would headline Bonnaroo 2012.
Over the past 24 hours word has spread that Daft Punk, Phoenix and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs will play Coachella 2013. What was the source of this information? An email from concert database site Songkick which showed those bands and The Rolling Stones aboard for the event. Someone took a screenshot of the email and word of the rumored appearances spread like wildfire. Even Rolling Stone picked it up.
Yesterday, Daft Punk revealed their official video for Derezzed (via MTV), the most quintessentially “Daft Punk” song on the soundtrack for the upcoming movie sequel, Tron: Legacy. Fans of the old school arcade game will appreciate this, as it pays homage to the original Tron video game with the jousting & futuristic motorbikes. Daft Punk’s soundtrack has prompted a hearty debate from fans of the duo, as it’s much more of a traditional film score than that of a Daft Punk album. Well, at least if there is one thing everyone can agree on; it’s that Tron: Legacy is going to look really cool.
Tonight was a big night for Phoenix as the French alt-popsters headlined at Madison Square Garden in New York City. In breaking wews, Robot Dance masters Daft Punk sat in with their fellow frenchman during the encore for a smoking version of 1901. The live remix contained Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger and One More Time samples. Bon Appetit, NYC.
[Photo by Tyler Hurlbut]
Here’s the best video to surface thus far…
Additional comments from friend of HT, Tyler Hurlbut, who was at MSG…
Just got back from the show. Solid show, very similar to the one I saw in Central Park last September but solid none the less. Encore began with the band about 3/4 of the way back on the floor and they did a couple acoustic tunes and for the second they said they came all the way from France and wanted to sing an old French pop song. They headed back to the stage and soon after Daft Punk emerged and began teasing Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger and some One More Time samples before dropping into 1901. I will say that I would have really enjoyed more of a “collaboration” and was really hoping for them to do a Daft Punk tune together. 1901 > One More Time would have brought the house down!
The demise of former ultra-hyped blog buzz band Clap Your Hands Say Yeah may have been a bit exaggerated by the same sources that had previously hailed them. The Brooklyn-based band had supposedly played their “final” gig at BAM last month before going on an indefinite hiatus, that was until Wednesday when the newly reunited act stopped by NBC’s Late Night With Jimmy Fallon to debut their new song Statue.
While CYHSY have made no promises about their future, they have made the new tune available as a free download via their website.
Finally, former New York Yankee center fielder and classically trained guitarist Bernie Williams will release his sophomore effort Moving Forward on April 14. The 14 track mostly instrumental album features a “mixture of classical and jazz guitar topped-off with additional Latin rhythms” and includes a special cover of Glory Days featuring Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa on vocals. The one-time Allmans collaborator will celebrate the release with a special show at NYC’s Nokia Theatre on April 18, with tickets currently on-sale.
The iClips crew heads to Kansas this weekend, where they’ll be webcasting directly from Wakarusa for the next three days. We’re still waiting for the final schedule to come out, but The Flaming Lips, STS9, Leftover Salmon, Lotus and Tea Leaf Green are among the artists performing at the event.
Let’s see what else is goin’ on this Friday:
BV shares a vid of Daft Hands plus an acapella Daft Punk chorus
Finally, be sure to check out this fabulous new edition of Jambands’ Video Elsewhere column. As usual, this installment is chock full of great clips. We especially got a big kick out of this video from 1993 featuring String Cheese Incident’s Michael Kang and Billy Nershi playing a lift line for tips.
Our intrepid reporter Sleepy Floyd probably can’t feel his face this morning…but he sent in this communication from the Vegoose festival this weekend:
This year’s Vegoose festival surely is different from the two prior incarnations. Sam Boyd Stadium — off the “lovely” Boulder Highway, lying next to a cookie-cutter subdivision that’s infinitely more Phoenix than Las Vegas — is still very much the same. But the lineup and the scene have each evolved in record time.
More closely resembling Lollapalooza than a typical jamband festival, there were more Daft Punk T-shirts than tie-dyes, and Trojan condoms were being passed out instead of free hugs. If a lineup of Mastodon, Queens of the Stone Age and Rage Against the Machine weren’t enough to scare the hippies away, try adding Public Enemy, Lupe Fiasco and M.I.A. And if that didn’t do the trick, maybe invite Muse, Ghostface Killah and the biggest anti-hippie of ‘em all: Iggy Pop.
Gogol Bordello makes people forget about Big Ten football
Although the “scene” itself has changed, the mission is still the same for the folks at Superfly: throw a ton of music our way at the same time and keep us running between stages. Not a bad way to be spending your afternoon, as long as it keeps you away from the $5-a-slice pizza. I love Spicy Pie? Maybe at $3 a slice I’d love you long time — talk about a markup. So read on after the jump for a recap of the festival and some quality photos from our man on the ground…
The lineup for October’s Echo Project just keeps on getting better. Les Claypool, the Flaming Lips and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah are among the additions playing the festival, which takes place outside Atlanta on October 12th – 14th.
Passon of the Weiss breaks down some of the Angels’ pre-at-bat songs
That’s all we have for now. Well that’s not true…we’re also excited that Van Morrison will be playing at the United Palace on October 14th. See ya there!
Apple is getting in on the social music scene started by Last.fm, MOG and iLike with the launch of MyiTunes. The new service is a series of three embeddable widgets that can help you tell the world what is in your iTunes collection. But there’s more: Tech Crunch does a nice job of examining why Apple started MyiTunes, and like Brown, what the new widgets can do for you.
And as always on Mondays, read on after the jump for a full roster of setlists from the weekend, including The Black Crowes, Bob Dylan, Gillian Welch, Ween, Rush, Ozzy, Peter Gabriel and the String Cheese Incident’s final notes…
on April 14. The 14 track mostly instrumental album features a “mixture of classical and jazz guitar topped-off with additional Latin rhythms” and includes a special cover of Glory Days featuring Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa on vocals. The one-time 
