Daft Punk‘s Random Access Memories campaign is already one of 2013’s most meticulously crafted album campaigns yet.
Along with the Collaborators video series they’ve been running for the past month, as well as those blink-and-you’ll-miss-it SNL teasers, the sneaky French dance robots revealed a 2-minute trailer for “Get Lucky,” their upcoming single, last night at Coachella.
The clip gives us our first taste of actual vocals from the track, provided by the ever-dreamy Pharrell, as well as some cuts of Nile Rodgers and the robots having one major robo-jam session in shimmering sequined suits.
Meanwhile, Rolling Stone published the very first interview with the French dance duo today, which revealed that the teaser’s premiere was yet another step in the slow unveiling of the record:
Surprised festival-goers at the main stage began dancing and pointing camera phones, oblivious to the fact that the French dance heroes – Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo – were in fact standing in civilian garb on the edge of the VIP section, watching themselves on the screens with delight. (Pharrell was standing nearby, and he gave Thomas a high five afterwards.) When the screens went black, Thomas and Guy-Manuel were shown tweets from attendees giddy about what they’d just seen. Thomas grinned. “The fun part will be seeing the footage people shot when it hits the Internet,” he said.
And now, here’s that footage in question.
AMAZING.
Fun fact for the Britney stans out there (as all roads lead to Godney in my head): Pharrell and Nile Rodgers both collaborated with Britney on Britney! Pharrell, of course, produced “I’m A Slave 4 U” and “Boys,” while Rodgers provided that unforgettable guitar on “Anticipating.” Coincidence? PROBABLY—BUT MAYBE NOT.
Back to Rolling Stone, the interview is a must-read: The duo share amazing insights into the state of music today (“Electronic music right now is in its comfort zone and it’s not moving one inch…that’s not what artists are supposed to do”), talk about the sound of their new record (“There’s this thing today where the recorded human voice is processed to try to feel robotic…here, we were trying to make robotic voices sound the most human they’ve ever sounded”), discuss studio time with Kanye West for his upcoming album and, most amazing of all, reveal that they started working with Pharrell because they met at a Madonna listening party (presumably for Hard Candy):
“We were at a party for Madonna’s last album,” Pharrell recalls, “and I was like, You guys should have produced this! Why did that not happen? Madonna and the robots would have been unbelievable! They were like, We’re working on something. I said, Whatever you do, call me – I’ll play tambourine on it. They looked at each other and they were like, We’ll be in touch.” Pharrell wound up singing on “Get Lucky” and a stomping disco track called “Lose Yourself to Dance.”
Oh yeah, and they’re collaborating with French fashion house Saint Laurent Paris too.
SYSTEM OVERLOAD.