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The Great Gatsby
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Thomas Bangalter Quotes

Usually, a band 20 years into its existence doesn’t put out its best records.

– Thomas Bangalter

Technology has made music accessible in a philosophically interesting way, which is great. But on the other hand, when everybody has the ability to make magic, it’s like there’s no more magic – if the audience can just do it themselves, why are they going to bother?

– Thomas Bangalter

Daft Punk would not exist if there was no technology.

– Thomas Bangalter

Initially, electronic music was anti-establishment, as punk rock and rock n’ roll were. The music was shut down; the police were against the parties.

– Thomas Bangalter

When you look at C-3PO and Darth Vader and then look at the actors behind them, you can’t really make the connection. It kills the magic.

– Thomas Bangalter

It’s really interesting to just look at the career of a musician and a producer that went into many different genres and many different styles and many different places but always breaking the barriers between genres and at some point reinventing himself all along the way but also inventing things at the same time.

– Thomas Bangalter

There have been movies like ‘Paranormal Activity’ or ‘Blair Witch Project’ in Hollywood that showed you could do movies with little or no money. It doesn’t prevent them from creating larger than life spectacles as well.

– Thomas Bangalter

It’s a very subjective, personal, instinctive approach as musicians of saying, ‘We don’t want to replace what’s around; we just want to widen the possibilities.’

– Thomas Bangalter

Usually, the 24-hour, high-maintenance celebrity lifestyle can disconnect people from reality.

– Thomas Bangalter

The concept of the robot encapsulates both aspects of technology. On one hand it’s cool, it’s fun, it’s healthy, it’s sexy, it’s stylish. On the other hand it’s terrifying, it’s alienating, it’s addictive, and it’s scary. That has been the subject of much science-fiction literature.

– Thomas Bangalter

Artists are overcompensating with this aggressive, energetic, hyperstimulating music – it’s like someone shaking you. But it can’t move people on an emotional level.

– Thomas Bangalter

The late ’70’s and early ’80s is the zenith of a certain craftsmanship in sound recording.

– Thomas Bangalter

There’s a confusion sometimes with the laptop being the current tools and where electronic music initially comes from.

– Thomas Bangalter

Computers were never designed in the first place to become musical instruments. Within a computer, everything is sterile – there’s no sound, there’s no air. It’s totally code. Like with computer-generated effects in movies, you can create wonders. But it’s really hard to create emotion.

– Thomas Bangalter

In the history of pop music, a lot of great records cost an enormous amount of money. There used to be a time where people that had means to experiment would do it, you know?

– Thomas Bangalter

I remember when I was a kid, I would watch ‘Superman’, and I was super into the feeling of knowing that Clark Kent is Superman and no one knows.

– Thomas Bangalter

The spirit of house music, electronic music, in the beginning was to break the rules, to do things in many different ways.

– Thomas Bangalter

In ‘Scream 2’, they have this discussion about how sequels always suck.

– Thomas Bangalter

The only secret to being in control is to have it in the beginning. Retaining control is still hard, but obtaining control is virtually impossible.

– Thomas Bangalter

I think ‘Tron’ is a good example of minimalism.

– Thomas Bangalter

It’s very strange how electronic music formatted itself and forgot that its roots are about the surprise, freedom, and the acceptance of every race, gender, and style of music into this big party. Instead, it started to become this electronic lifestyle which also involved the glorification of technology.

– Thomas Bangalter

Everyone making electronic music has the same tool kits and templates. You listen, and you feel like it can be done on an iPad. If everybody knows all the tricks, it’s no more magic.

– Thomas Bangalter

Technology is an interesting subject, people thinking: how much good, and how much bad, does it inherently carry?

– Thomas Bangalter

When you look at what we can call the golden era of concept albums, which starts in the mid or late ’60s and ends maybe in the early ’80s, it’s an interesting time for music. You see all these very established and popular acts and bands and artists that were somehow on the top of their game but really trying to experiment.

– Thomas Bangalter

There was a naive quality in 1982 around technology and the start of video games. And that’s like the start of electronic music – there was this statement and, ideologically, these things to fight for.

– Thomas Bangalter

Music was a vector that we wanted to build a universe around.

– Thomas Bangalter