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Best New Music
By Ryan Dombal
November 20, 2007
The blitzing “Pimp My Pyramid” scheme. The pulsing honeycomb. The tiny metal heads bobbing up and down. The Lite-Brite leather jacket reveal. The dude in front of me who wouldn’t let a pair of crutches stop him from dancing as if the apocalypse were mere minutes away. The sensual explosion that was Daft Punk ’s Alive 2007 show is difficult to overstate—or reproduce. Even with the biggest, flattest, sharpest HD setup, there's no way to sufficiently recreate the most exuberant LED-laden music blowout ever staged. So Daft Punk didn’t even try: There will be no Alive 2007 DVD.
Commenting on the decision, Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter recently told Pitchfork, “The thousands of clips on the internet are better to us than any DVD that could have been released.” And, in many ways, the Alive tour is a perfect match for YouTube—the ancient Egypt by-way-of “The Jetsons” spectacle barrelling its way through shitty compression quality with blinding force. But still, even the most hectic web clip can’t equal the French duo’s visceral sound-and-vision assault, so the focus of Alive 2007 falls on the reason why Daft Punk were allowed to lug 11 tons of equipment around the world for the last 19 months in the first place: their music. Playing like a flawlessly sequenced and paced greatest hits album, this full-set Paris recording from June finds Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo connecting the booms among their three albums while officially cementing one of the year’s most rewarding and welcomed comebacks.
Lest we forget, before the out-of-nowhere debut of the now-iconic 3D triangle in April 2006, it seemed like Daft Punk lost the plot. The monster riffage and mind-numbing gloom of 2005’s Human After All had our favorite party-starters turning downright nihilistic. And early screenings of their art-house opus, Electroma , evoked (unfortunately accurate) comparisons to Vincent Gallo’s on-the-road/oral sex epic Brown Bunny (except with endless scenes of hunk-o-metal ennui filling in for the graphic oral sex). After the shattering pop breakthrough of 2001’s Discovery , Daft Punk were going through an especially angsty adolescence—their spit-shined heads way up their own asses. But then, amped-up with enough electricity to illuminate a black hole, French house’s masked men upstaged Madonna , previous electronic pioneers Depeche Mode , and (ironically) Kanye West at 2006’s Coachella. And now, they’re everywhere (except Gap ads, thankfully)—getting sampled on No. 1 hip-hop songs, filling magazine spreads, spawning worthy would-be successors and, of course, owning the internet (on Flickr, Daft Punk photos currently outnumber Justin Timberlake snaps 2:1). With a bounty of latent good will on their side thanks to the incredible re-playability of their first two albums, Daft Punk finally gave fans a million flashing reasons to fall in love with them all over again.
One of the most remarkable aspects of Alive 2007 is how well it recontextualizes career nadir Human After All , turning previously leaden songs into ebullient rock’n’roll manifestos; injected with Homework ’s air-tight Moroder -style anthems or Discovery ’s flamboyant funk, Human After All tracks are constantly improved and born anew. The live set doesn’t simply run through the hits, mindlessly segueing from one smash to another. Instead, well-worn favorites are glued together, cut-up and mashed into pieces. The titular refrains of “Television Rules the Nation” and “Around the World” combine to form the globe’s most dance-friendly TV station theme song before the Black Sabbath crunch of “Television” is sent down upon the impossibly buoyant “Crescendolls,” resulting in the disc’s most unlikely-yet-spectacular roller coaster peak. Meanwhile, the creepy hiss of “Steam Machine” is atomized and given space-age dynamics, turning it from a oddball bore into a fist-pumping celebration of the industrial age. Wisely, the duo also know when to let the bass be, allowing large portions of unfuckwithable classics like “Da Funk” and “Burnin’” to work their magic with little robo-meddling. Even without video, Alive 2007 is an exercise in exacting excess, from the blaring “Robot Rock” intro to a wide-eyed power-booster of a encore that layers “One More Time" atop “ Music Sounds Better With You ”—a combination so “holy shit” ecstatic it would seem downright cocky if it wasn’t so blissful.
Talking about the relationship between artist and audience, Bangalter told Paper , “Robots don’t make people feel like there’s an idol on stage. It’s more like a rave party where the DJ isn’t important. We are two robots in this pyramid with this light show, but everything is [meant] for you to have fun and enjoy yourself.” He’s absolutely right about the “have fun and enjoy yourself” bit, but the Alive tour separated itself from the millions of DJ parties before it by drawing attention to a fixed point while incorporating everything from Kiss -esque pomp to Space Invaders retro-future shock. The results were massive—the myriad “best show ever” kudos deserved. And, just as they hold back their identities at every chance, it makes sense for Daft Punk to hold back the Alive visuals; when more and more mystery is constantly being sucked out of popular music thanks to the insatiable hunger for fresh product and up-to-the-nanosecond information, the duo aren’t about to release an imagination-stifling DVD filled with behind-the-scenes tour bus inanity. It’s a noble choice, especially when the consolation prize happens to be the Ultimate Daft Punk Mixtape.
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Alive 2007 Tracklist
Robot rock / oh yeah lyrics, touch it / technologic lyrics, television rules the nation / crescendolls lyrics, too long / steam machine lyrics, around the world / harder, better, faster, stronger lyrics, burnin' / too long lyrics, face to face / short circuit lyrics, one more time / aerodynamic lyrics, aerodynamic beats / forget about the world lyrics, prime time of your life / brainwasher / rollin' & scratchin' / alive lyrics, da funk / daftendirekt lyrics, superheroes / human after all / rock'n roll lyrics, human after all / together / one more time / music sounds better with you (ft. stardust & together) lyrics, one more time / aerodynamic / aerodynamic beats / forget about the world lyrics, harder, better, faster, stronger (alive 2007 radio edit) lyrics.
Daft Punk’s Alive 2007 showcases the band’s 2006/2007 world tour. The stage design was renowned for its “pyramid” setup, a facet of the show replicated in part on the album cover.
The album was recorded at a June 14, 2007, show at the former Bercy Arena in Paris, France.
“Alive 2007” Q&A
Album credits.
Random Access Memories (10th Anniversary Edition)
Homework (25th Anniversary Edition)
- Live albums
Alive 2007 (album)
Alive 2007 is a live album released by Daft Punk in 2007. It features live songs from their performance at Bercy in Paris , France, on their Alive 2007 tour.
The album won the Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2009. A live version of " Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger ", containing elements of "Television Rules the Nation / Crescendolls" and "Around the World / Harder Better Faster Stronger", also won a Grammy that year for Best Electronic/Dance Recording.
The physical release in North America was delayed to December 4 due to production issues, but the album became available as a digital download on November 20, 2007. A special edition of the album was released that includes the encore from the Alive 2007 tour on a second disc, which is included on the digital copy as well. It also includes a 50-page book containing photographs from the tour taken by DJ Falcon.
- 1 Structure
- 2 Reception
- 3 Track listing
- 4 References
Structure [ ]
The Alive 2007 set used Ableton Live software on "custom made super-computers" for the show. Daft Punk accessed the hardware remotely with Behringer BCR2000 MIDI controllers and JazzMutant Lemur touchscreen pads within the central pyramid. Minimoog Voyager RME units were also implemented for the live performances. The four Voyager units and two Behringer mixers allowed Daft Punk to "mix, shuffle, trigger loops, filter, distort samples, EQ in and out, transpose or destroy and deconstruct synth lines". The majority of the equipment was stored away during the live sets within offstage towers.
The recording of Alive 2007 was derived from Daft Punk's live performance at their Bercy show on June 14, 2007. Reviews of the set noted how Daft Punk manipulated and reworked their established material. One report spotted vocal elements from the song " Too Long " mixed with newly-generated accompaniment. The overlapped mixtures of " Television Rules the Nation " with " Crescendolls ", " Around the World " with " Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger " and " Superheroes " with " Human After All " were reported to be well received by the audience. The set itself was considered a collection of Daft Punk's most popular recordings. The performances heavily featured tracks from Daft Punk's album Human After All , prompting critics to reconsider what they felt about the album.
The visuals of the 2006 and Alive 2007 tour were set up by XL Video. The company provided eight-core Mac Pro units running Catalyst v4 and Final Cut Pro. Daft Punk approached the company with their visual concept for the shows. "They came to us with a pretty fixed idea of what they wanted", said the head of XL Video, Richard Burford. "They wanted to mix live video with effects. Using the eight-core Mac Pros, we were able to take in eight digital sources and treat them as video streams. Then they could use Catalyst to coordinate the video with lighting effects and add their own effects in on the fly. The final digital video streams ran to LED screens."
The performances for the Alive 2007 tour were an expansion of Daft Punk's 2006 live sets. Noted additions include elements of the tracks " Burnin' " and " Phoenix " as well as an encore. Bangalter explained that the 2006 sets were initially designed for performances within larger festivals, but later refined to accommodate Daft Punk-specific shows. "The goal was to try and bring a complete global experience to the audience". The introduction for the live show featured the five-note sequence used in the movie "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".
The album includes elements of the Busta Rhymes song " Touch It ", the original version of which was produced by Swizz Beatz featuring a sample of " Technologic ". Also featured are elements of Gabrielle's " Forget About the World ", the original version of which was remixed by Daft Punk for her single. The encore of the Alive 2007 set features Bangalter's side projects: Stardust 's " Music Sounds Better with You " and Together 's self-titled track " Together ". Many songs from Human After All: Remixes are utilized, like Robot Rock (Maximum Overdrive Mix) and The Prime Time of Your Life (Para One Remix) .
Reception [ ]
Alive 2007 was generally met with praise upon release. Pitchfork Media regarded the recording as "the Ultimate Daft Punk Mixtape", specifically noting how songs from the album Human After All had been "constantly improved and born anew" for the live set. The sentiment was also shared by Allmusic, stating that "It has the feel of a greatest-hits-live concert, but energized by Daft Punk's talents at weaving songs in and out of each other". The publication ultimately considered Alive 1997 the stronger of their two live albums, however. A review by The Star noted that the release and Daft Punk's concurrent tours cumulatively restored the duo's reputation following the mixed reception of their two earlier studio albums.
Sputnikmusic stated that the Alive 2007 performance was closer to a theatrical production than a traditional concert, and that the album "could just as easily be a studio concoction". Entertainment Weekly, however, felt that the live crowd enhanced the positive mood of the performance. Rolling Stone stated that Alive 2007 "loses some of the essential experience" of attending the live Daft Punk events. The Phoenix also felt that the album package would have benefited from more video content, expressing that a key factor of the live show was its implementation of visual elements. In his first positive review for a Daft Punk album, Robert Christgau believed that a full video representation was avoided because "too much scale, flesh and bodily effluvia would be lost". Thomas Bangalter expressed his reasons for not releasing a DVD by stating "the thousands of clips on the internet are better to us than any DVD that could have been released".
On December 3, 2008, Alive 2007 and its single "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" received Grammy Award nominations for Best Electronic/Dance Album and Best Dance Recording, respectively. Both the album and the single were announced as winners during the 51st Grammy Awards pre-telecast ceremony.
Track listing
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | " / " | 6:28 |
| 2. | " / " | 5:30 |
| 3. | " / " | 4:51 |
| 4. | " / " | 7:02 |
| 5. | " / " | 5:43 |
| 6. | " / " | 7:12 |
| 7. | " / " | 4:55 |
| 8. | " / " | 6:11 |
| 9. | " / " | 3:32 |
| 10. | " / / / " | 10:22 |
| 11. | " / " | 6:37 |
| 12. | " / / " | 5:41 |
| 13. | " / / / " | 9:58 |
References [ ]
- ↑ Daft Punk YouTube Channel . YouTube.com. Retrieved 6 September 2007 .
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IMAGES
VIDEO
COMMENTS
posting this here for archival purposes. love this set to death but I always wanted a better, cleaner audio mix of the encore. so imagine my surprise when I ...
Alive 2007 is the second and final live album by the French electronic music duo Daft Punk, released on 19 November 2007 by Virgin Records.It features Daft Punk's performance at the Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy arena in Paris on 14 June 2007 during their Alive tour. The set features an assortment of Daft Punk's music, incorporated with synthesisers, mixers and live effects.
Credit to all the people who've uploaded their videos over the years.All rights reserved to: Parlophone France, EMI Records Ltd., Warner Music Group, and Daf...
Amazing concert of DAFT PUNKEnd of concert:=====Encore Human After All - Together - One More Time - Music Sounds Better with You (Stardust)
Daft Punk Alive 2007 Full Performance + Encore! 8 years ago. Daniela Moll. I downloaded this a while back, before it was taken down on YT. This is a compilation of videos taken of Alive 2007, in decent quality (the best I can find so far!).
It's daft punk but alive. That's all I need to say. ... Are there any Vinyl versions of the Alive 2007 encore with human after all/together/one more time/music sounds better with you out there except the on limited edition? love the mix but I did not find it anywhere and don´t want to pay 200€ just for one extra vinyl.
The sensual explosion that was Daft Punk's Alive 2007 show is difficult to overstate—or reproduce. Even with the biggest, flattest, sharpest HD setup, there's no way to sufficiently recreate ...
posting this here for archival purposes. love this set to death but I always wanted a better, cleaner audio mix of the encore. so imagine my surprise when I ...
Daft Punk's Alive 2007 showcases the band's 2006/2007 world tour. The stage design was renowned for its "pyramid" setup, a facet of the show replicated in part on the album cover.
Alive 2007 is a live album released by Daft Punk in 2007. It features live songs from their performance at Bercy in Paris, France, on their Alive 2007 tour. The album won the Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2009. A live version of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger", containing elements of "Television Rules the Nation / Crescendolls" and "Around the World / Harder Better Faster ...
Daft Punk - Alive 2007. More images. Label:Virgin - CDVIRX 224, Virgin - 509995098390: Format: CD, Album. CD, Enhanced. All Media, Limited Edition, Mixed, Digibook. Country:France: ... Are there any Vinyl versions of the Alive 2007 encore with human after all/together/one more time/music sounds better with you out there except the on ...
1d. pancakeben. 91. just the right amount of new and old. 2d. Skiido. 100. "Alive 2007" is one of the best live albums of all time, and what is considered to be Daft Punk's magnum opus. This album is funky, insanely fun, and has some of the best mashups I could imagine between Daft Punk songs.
The historical consensus is that Daft Punk's pyramid show—which debuted at Coachella in April 2006 and toured the world throughout 2007—was ground zero for the EDM explosion that fused kinetic dance music with eye-popping visuals, catapulting the genre to the top of the charts.
This sounds correct after giving it another listen, and yeah truly crazy that they got 7 songs in the Encore. 🙏🏻. other than the ones in the title: music sounds better with you - stardust, together - thomas bangalter and dj falcon, prime time of your life para one remix.
Notes. Recorded in Palais Omnisport Paris Bercy, 14 June 2007. Track 1a incorporates elements of "Release The Beast" by Kae Williams. Contains a sample of "Release The Beast", performed by Breakwater. Track 5b contains a sample from "Cola Bottle Baby", returned by Edwin Birdsong. Track 12a contains a sample from "Who's Been Sleeping In My Bed ...
Daft Punk's Alive 2007, and everything that came with it, set the stage for what we now know as EDM. They set the standard for what was capable of DJs performing live, and created the well-followed guidelines for putting on incredible shows. Artists like Zedd, Porter Robinson, and countless others have followed in their footsteps, and stage ...
Listen, order & watch now: https://bio.to/daftpunk"Human After All / Together / One More Time / Music Sounds Better With You" is taken from "Alive 2007"avail...
Alive 2007 Encore . Just found it on Spotify, what the heck? How have I never heard this mashup before? EDIT: My favourite part is from about 4 minutes onwards, the whole sequence through Together and Human After All, then One More Time and ultimately Music Sounds Better With You. ... Related Daft Punk Electronic music Disco Soundtrack Music ...
Yeah when Together turns into Music Sounds Better With You it's my favorite Daft Punk moment in any song Reply reply [deleted] • Never knew this track existed, was at the Toronto date of the 2007 tour. ... and I feel like "Contact" as a finale perfectly matches the intensity of that encore as the Alive 2007 finale. Reply reply
I had to post this now that they're gone.
Where did that "Die" sample from Alive 2007 Encore come from? Discussion I have always wondered where that "die" or "life" sample came from. I been all over the internet, but I could not find a straight answer. ... Contact is a great song to close off RAM and Daft Punk's discography (in my opinion)
Mua Beat Saber - Daft Punk Music Pack BỘ (?) Bao gồm 10 vật phẩm: Beat Saber - Daft Punk - Around The World, Beat Saber - Daft Punk - Around The World / Harder Better Faster Stronger, Beat Saber - Daft Punk - Da Funk / Daftendirekt, Beat Saber - Daft Punk - Get Lucky (feat.
Daft Punk Alive 2007 12'' Encore Vinyl . I just ordered the deluxe box set (solely for the encore vinyl) and love the alive etching on the back of it. ... The first three Daft Punk albums all have the signature of the same engineer. Can't remember about the others. If I recall correctly disc 2 of RAM has "If love is the answer you're home ...
Daft Punk controlled all the stuff with various hardware and software (including Ableton Live and MIDI controllers iirc). As far as I can tell, the only post-production touchup for the album was the removal of the Close Encounters of the Third Kind jingle. It was used in the live show to signal Daft Punk entering the stage at the start.