Released around twenty one years ago - Daft Punk's junior album Human After All divided many professional critics upon release, and for understandable reasons. I'll make this very clear, right from the get go, and admit that Human After All is a very, very different record from its predecessors - both in sound and in overall tone. Homework is built for clubbing, and had tons of American influence, and Discovery (which remains my favourite record of all time!) is a perfect record from start to finish, filled with iconic filter house classics, warm, glittery pop and themes of childhood. In comparison, Human After All is cold, somewhat dystopian, repetitive and machine like - which is somewhat fitting, seeing as it was around this time the enigmatic Parisian duo decided to lean fully into their robot personas, but despite the change in sound - which to many, seemed jarring and odd - in my eyes, Human After All is still a fantastic record, just with a little less glamour.
Before I dive into talking about the record in the way I usually do when writing reviews, I feel like a small bit of context is needed. For those who don't know - Human After All was recorded in six weeks between mid-September and early November 2004, just under a year after the Discovery era ended with the release of their incredible animated film Interstella 5555 - and it was described by the press as a spontaneous and direct album, whilst also being influenced by the stuff that was going on in Thomas Bangalter's life at the time - with the duo set on creating a record all about fear and paranoia, injecting themes about the dangers (and positive aspects) of technology to boot.
With all of this information in mind, it paints a much clearer picture about Human After All as a whole, and the opening string of tracks (namely, the title track, The Prime Time of Your Life and the global, smash hit Robot Rock) establish the themes and ideas mentioned above easily and quickly - grungy synths and guitars, heavy talk box usage and punchy production take center stage, and the polished sounds of Discovery are completely tossed aside for something much grittier, yet welcome in my eyes. As the album progresses and goes into the end of its first half, things get a lot stranger and quirkier overall - the lively, yet impossibly claustrophobic Steam Machine leads into the oddly beautiful Make Love, which remains one of my favourite Daft Punk songs ever, largely because of the buttery smooth production and stunning piano work throughout - closing Human After All's first half in a rather unexpected fashion.
Although Make Love is able to give the listener a quick chance to breathe amongst all of the roughness in this record - this very abruptly shifts upon the second half of the album starting - with the almost techno-esque classic The Brainwasher serving as a stark reminder to seasoned fans of the album's overall tone, the warmth and sentimentality of Make Love completely discarded in what I'd consider to be a damn clever move. Following on from this, Human After All reaches its darkest, dingiest and most dystopic point, with the inclusion of Television Rules The Nation and Technologic. Whilst Technologic is a well known (and very catchy) classic, with hundreds of millions of streams possibly bolstered by the (very scary!) music video featuring that one really odd animatronic puppet built from parts of the killer doll Chucky - Television Rules The Nation is the complete opposite - it's oddly slow, a stark contrast from the majority of the cuts on this album, and it removes the grooviness (not that there's much, but I somewhat feel it!) of the album's biggest hits and gives way to something a lot more melancholic and strange, showing Daft Punk at possibly their most mature (until Random Access Memories came out, that is!) - to add, it also feels very relevant in regards to now common parts of every day life, such as social media, and while the intention is generally disputed, it sure as hell seems like it!
Finally, Human After All closes with the excellent Emotion, which, brilliantly mixes the sharpness of the majority of the album, and the warmth provided by some parts to boot - ending out the record on an extremely high note, as the duo pretty much always do with their full-length releases, with what is also one of my favourite Daft Punk tracks. It's unique, it's emotional, it's somewhat bittersweet, and above all, it's a rather sweet reminder that even if the duo, by this point had fully leaned into the iconic personas during the mid-2000s, they always were on the human side of art (but you could also say the same thing for the title of the record, too...) - so way to go, Thomas and Guy-Man!
I'll go back to what I said in the intro to this review - Human After All, is by no means, a perfect album. There's flaws, and at times it's incredibly idiosyncratic, muddy in nature and a far cry from what the duo were, at the time, known for - but musically, with the relevance it holds today, and also for its usage in the legendary Alive 2007 tour - people have since, majorly warmed up to it, and there's not one bit of filler in my eyes, and every single track still holds up super well. In terms of personal taste, it's the Daft Punk record I generally listen to the least - largely because I prefer the sweeping instrumentation of Random Access Memories, the joy of Discovery and the rawness of Homework - but in no means, do the ideas and things explored on this album turn me away whatsoever. It's different, and I love records that sound different, and if you had to ask me - I would absolutely recommend this album to any new, budding fan of the legendary duo, simply because it's super, super awesome, and a listening experience that's intriguing and pretty damn wild.
Rating: 8.5/10
You can find Human After All on all major streaming platforms now.
There you have it, everyone!
I hope you've enjoyed reading today's review, and as always - keep enjoying your stay at the discotheque.
is this thing on? hello this is minty. and this was a pretty good review :3
ReplyDeletethank you!!
Deletethis is a really cool review, I think it was back when they were also trying to follow a bit of the bloghouse scene, which may be why they also went full on with the distortion and the synthesis behind the album.
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