Definitely, one of the news that marked 2021 was neither more nor less than the separation of Daft Punk. Nobody could believe that one of the most important duos in history and key pieces for electronic music. And we are not exaggerating when we say that there is a before and after of French robots.
Perhaps what hurt us the most to learn about the end of Daft Punk was that Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo announced it from one day to the next. But above all, that neither of these two DJ’s and producers ever said the reasons why they were separating. Although now, After almost three years of that sad moment, we already know the reason why they said goodbye.
Thomas Bangalter Revealed The Real Reason For Daft Punk’s Split
It turns out that a few days ago, the BBC interviewed Thomas Bangalter for the premiere of his new solo album, Mythologies, with which he begins a new stage in his career. However, aside from talking about this studio album, They also asked him about the separation of Daft Punk and to everyone’s surprise, talked about it… just as they read it.
Thomas Bangalter declared that the main cause for both him and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo to shelve Daft Punk was precisely, they no longer wanted to be seen as the robots that made world hits.
“Daft Punk was a project that blurred the line between fact and fiction with these robot characters. It was a very important point for me and Guy-Man(uel) not to ruin the narrative while it was happening. This project was an exploration that started with the machines and ended up moving away from them. I love technology as a tool, but I am terrified of the nature of the relationship between machines and us.”
Thomas Bangalter also spoke about the creative process behind Daft Punk and the ‘Random Access Memories’ reissue.
To finish with the issue of the separation of Daft Punk, Thomas Bangalter said that although the duo’s songs were made with keyboards, synthesizers and other electronic instruments, they always wanted to show that they had a human side. Besides, With a low hand, he made a comment about artificial intelligence.
“Now that the story is over, I found it interesting to reveal part of the creative process that relies heavily on humans and not algorithms of any kind.. We tried to use these machines to express something extremely moving that no machine can really feel, but humans can.”
“We have always been on the side of humanity and not of technology. And as much as I love this character, the last thing I would want to be, in the world we live in this 2023, he is a robot.”
And if, although many hope that in the future, Daft Punk will return, Thomas Bangalter did not even open the possibility to see him again wearing the iconic helmets alongside Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. Although yes, we still have the 10th anniversary reissue of Random Access Memories, which will hit digital platforms on May 12 with demos and outtakes.
About the unpublished version of “Fragments of Time”, a song where they collaborate again with the singer Todd Edwards, Thomas Bangalter stated that this recording was very funny and unexpected, because both of them did not know that the engineer was recording the session: “It was a beautiful moment… very happy”.
No way, we just have to wait for time to pass to see if there is a chance to see Daft Punk again. What do you say? Do you think Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo will put on their robot helmets again?
