Random Access Memories review

Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories has a strong undercurrent of the techno music movement. Synthesizers and other instruments are used to lend the album an almost robotic feel. Upon listening to the album for the first time, it seems as though the listener has been sent to a world where music has become robotic and has fully embraced the technological realm. The sounds played give this impression and reinforce it in the listener. Soon, however, the songs begin to play, and these songs, though varied, seem to support the overarching viewpoint of the album, a salute to technology.
The title of the album itself supports this thesis, as RAM is used in a computing context to refer to the memory that a computer is allocated with. This shows that the album knows its technological basis, and carries it through.
However, in spite of this start, the songs played are earnest in their desire to bring to the listener another state of being. The two members of Daft Punk also occasionally interject parts of their own life stories into the songs and into the album, giving the album a slight personal touch that makes the album seem less cold and impersonal.
Their voices, however, vary depending on what the album requires of the voices given. Sometimes, the voices are modulated in such a way that the voices come out like the stereotypical voice of those cartoon robots whom exclaim that a function “does not compute.”
At other times, however, they sing in their own normal voice, and their own voices are supported by the instrumental backing them. Various effects are shown, as the album determines that it will surprise the listener as the backing increases its music and its pitch, but comes to an abrupt end where the listener does not expect an end to come.
This album lends itself heavily to experimentation, as the robotic personas of the band permit the grouping a certain degree of freedom in their recording. The best way to describe the persona held by Daft Punk, at least using an example that I am aware of, is imagining that the Beatles would have, after the release of Sgt. Pepper, taken on that persona for their albums.
That persona that the group holds allows Daft Punk to bring the worlds of science fiction and technology to the music on the album.
The album is an hour and thirteen minutes long, but the flow of the instrumentation and the songs on the album ensure that the time the listener spends listening to the album does indeed prove to be worthwhile. It is also a sign of just how much technology, that herald that Daft Punk emphasizes throughout this album, has changed the music business.
The album as released on vinyl would be considered a double album, as it readily exceeds an hour, but on CD and MP3, it is taken to be a single album. The advent of 90 minute CDs and MP3s which permit albums to be longer than in the days of vinyl allows there to be further experimentation, as the band does not have to be as concerned with ensuring that the music exceeds one side or another. This freedom allows the instrumentals and the effects to flow, giving the album a feeling of space, but also causing the album to seem like it does not know in which direction it wishes to head. Ultimately, the album does come to an end, as the vocals fade and the instruments keep on playing. Gradually they fade, which could be viewed as an artistic symbol representing the fact that the Random Access Memories which had held sway throughout the album, begin to fade, and ultimately disappear entirely, leaving mixed thoughts in the listener.
On the one hand, the music on the album is very good and it has a very high level of polish, making it a very “mainstream” album. Having said that, there is a clear likelihood that the appeal of the album makes it so that it will appeal somewhat more to certain categories of people. Funk and techno listeners, in particular, will enjoy the album. Rock listeners will in general enjoy the album as well, but some who listen to softer rock groups may feel that the effects are a bit “phoned in” and that the premise of the album isn’t quite accessible. What this means is that the listener does not know what the message of the album is. That’s fine, I mean, since concept albums are rare in music to begin with, but I don’t know if the idea is that the listener is supposed to make up what the album is about as it goes or if it is purely meant to be an artistic statement.
If it’s the former, the album’s commercial appeal means that it does not give ease to that idea. This is because most commercially successful albums have some sort of theme to them, even if they are not concept albums, because the listener needs some type of grasp on the album. This album does give the listener a vague idea, but in my opinion, not enough of one to make it a very easily accessible album.
The latter has a higher likelihood of being the case, as the album seems to be a sort of artistic statement on the intersection of music with technology. The concept may not be inherently accessible, but it does still appeal to most mainstream audiences.
Overall, the album is indeed quite good. It’s very smooth and polished, and its tracks are enjoyable to listen to. My main quibbles with the album have to do with the robotic modulation of the voices, which though kept to a relative minimum, are still present. The modulation isn’t bad, per se, but it does come a little bit of nowhere, and maybe it’s just the way I think, but I feel that the modulation acts as a bit of a gimmick. Some of the instrumental segments do engage in a bit of gimmickry, but most are enjoyable and bring the album to be more enjoyable. I feel that the album was good, but that its appeal is kind of hard to pinpoint.
It’s also unclear what the future will hold for the album. Might it still remain relevant ten to twenty years down the line? That is harder to say. But as of right now, it is a very good album, which though firmly rooted in techno and funk, can appeal to a large, mainstream audience. Perhaps that is what shows the album’s true genius: its ability to appeal to a wide mainstream audience while embracing punk and techno to create an album that signifies the emergence of electronic sound in the music world, a sound which though not as unique as the human voice, opens the door for the world of the future, a world yet to come.