The greatest electronica act of all time?
French dance music legends Daft Punk have split up, it has been confirmed.
The duo, better known to their families as Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter, confirmed the news in an eight-minute video entitled ‘Epilogue’.
The clip sees the duo walk around the desert in their iconic robot helmets, before one of them self-destructs.
It is followed by a messaged that says “1993 to 2021”.
Daft Punk broke through with their 1997 album Homework, which included hits ‘Around The World’ and ‘Da Funk’. And while their beats were instantly infectious, it was as much their visual creativity that made them stars. They wore big robot heads that obscured their identities (long before deadmau5 or Marshmallow did), and released a string of incredible, unique videos that involved anthropomorphic dogs trying to live in the big city, or perfectly choreographed dancing skeletons.
Their second album Discovery included some of their biggest singles, including ‘One More Time,’ ‘Digital Love’ and ‘Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger’, but was again memorable for its visual elemet: this time every song was accompanied by its own animated music video, which when strung together formed a full-length anime sci-fi movie.
2005’s Human After All did not have quite the same impact, but their score for Tron: Legacy was one of the best movie soundtracks of that decade, and in 2013 they triumphantly returned with the disco-tinged Random Access Memories, featuring appearances from Pharrell Williams, Julian Casablancas and Giorgio Moroder (‘Get Lucky’ will forever be the sound of this and every summer).
That proved to be their final studio album, but in 2016 they collaborated with The Weeknd on the singles ‘Starboy’ and ‘I Feel It Coming’. They also co-produced Kanye West’s 2013 album Yeezus, being credited for the tracks ‘I Am A God’, ‘Black Skinhead’, ‘On Sight’ and ‘Send It Up’.
