101. TRONNED

Ever had one of those recurring Space Odyssey dreams where you thought your space suit was suddenly cut off from your spaceship as you drift in space, counting the seconds as your oxygen levels deplete slowly marking your time of death?

Well, knock my astro-suit off then and get me a solid moonraker for the album of my week – Daft Punk’s upcoming soundtrack to the TRON LEGACY movie.

This six-track preview (or should I say online leak) is a surprising effort from Daft Punk that totally devolves from their previous works where repeated 2-dimensional beats and basslines would slap your eardrums at 120bpm while you bunny hop your way to total brain shutdown.

Well, that was the old Daft Punk. This version is so much more layered and interesting. Think swirling flavours on your favourite tiramisu cake, for one. 🙂

If I could aptly describe it, I would say the tracks on this upcoming album feels like an extension of David Bowie’s Space Oddity made for the year 3010.

Yeah, you heard right. Not 2010 but 3010. If Planet Earth is around at that time.

But instead of the action happening in the realm of Major Tom’s space mission, here it all takes place within the circuit cities of the most intelligent and devious mother board on the planet – TRON.

Daft Punk in full TRON garb

Plucking themselves firmly out of their house music roots, French musicians Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter bleep and electrocute listeners through 5 dark and droning tracks made just for the highly anticipated sequel of the decade TRON LEGACY.

This textured album pulls listeners in via a massive wave-pulsing atmospheric intro into the first 10-minute plus epic track titled ‘The Crash’ where an 80’s-like robotic voice fades in and out before typical Daft Punk-styled throbbing drumbeats drop in drastically to transport you right into the album’s core.

The journey then continues seamlessly through the hard drives of TRON with the next few tracks before it detours abruptly to old Daft Punk territory in a song titled ‘The Prestige -‘ the only downside to this album because it just doesn’t seem to fit in the  context of the other pieces in this work.

My guess is that the insertion was a business decision to appease all ‘One More Time’ Daft Punker fans out there to not only the music but the movie itself.

But thank goodness the happy jingle ends there before returning to the zapped out final track ‘Synopsis’ where the main melody throws you back to sounds you would find in the opening tune of a popular 80’s sci-fi TV show; an appropriate approach, I feel, since the original film was a huge sci-fi cult classic back then and probably something the film’s fans would certainly appreciate.

I say, go get this album when it comes out in October despite the one track shortfall because it’s Daft Punk like you’ve never heard before – Conceptualised and Unexpected.

The full soundtrack album is expected to be out later this October.

For more information on the film, go to: http://disney.go.com/tron/