60 Songs That Explain the '90s - “Around the World”—Daft Punk

Episode Date: July 12, 2023

Rob shares a list of the 10 most repetitive songs of the '90s, before diving into Daft Punk and their electronic hit “Around the World.” Later, Rob is joined by Pitchfork features editor Ryan Dombal to discuss meeting Daft Punk without their helmets on, Daft Punk as Dombal’s entrance to electronic music, and much more (56:00). Host: Rob Harvilla Guest: Ryan Dombal Producers: Jonathan Kermah and Justin Sayles Additional Production Support: Chloe Clark Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Bill Simmons from The Ringer, and this is a podcast called The Rewatchables. We have been doing it. Really since 2017, it started with how much we love the movie Heat. We decided to structure a whole podcast with categories, most rewatchable scene, who of the movie, Apex Mountain, what age the best. But here's the thing. If you want the full archive, you can hear them only on Spotify for free, by the way. So make sure to follow the rewatchables on Spotify.

The whole point is to find a song you like and then fixate on one little part of that song, often in the chorus, but not always, one little part, one line, one phrase, possibly even just one word in that song. You fixate on it and you mentally loop it and you let that loop run in your head for anywhere between two hours and three weeks. That's a whole point. What are you even listening to music for if you ain't? doing that. It feels weird to me to not have a song stuck in my head. It feels unnatural. It feels terrible.

I don't feel like myself. I don't feel optimized. I don't feel human. I need a song stuck in my head. I need that loop. I have always needed that loop. There is a hole in my head, one of them, that can only be filled by a four seconds or so loop of whatever song is currently stuck in my head. That loop is the battery. It's the key in the keyhole. It's the flux capacitor. It's one of my chaos emeralds. It's one of my infinity stones.

That's stupid. These metaphors are the product of one of the myriad other holes in my head. I've had a song stuck in my head since I was four years old and I like it. That's what I'm saying. The song changes, but pretty much I don't. This was one of the songs stuck in my head when I was four. James Taylor. Handyman from his 1977 album, J.T. James Taylor, the Jeff Buckley of no, no, no, shut up. So many holes in my head.

Handyman by James Taylor stuck in my comically large 98th percentile for head size, four-year-old head. But just that part stuck in my head. The comma, comma, comma, comma, comma, come, come, come, part. My parents told me that I loved that part, and I'd maybe sort of babble along to that part. Come, oh, come, come, come, come, adorable. I called this song the mailman song, even though James Taylor doesn't bring up the mailman at all. This song is about James Taylor sexing up on sad, vulnerable ladies. But still, the mailman song, adorable. Me, I'm adorable.

My head is so large, I often fall over for no discernible reason, but still, adorable. I confess I hadn't spent much time with the first big hit version of Handyman, the 1959 Jimmy Jones version, but let's just say Jimmy's version ain't about the mailman either. I used to go door to door in my neighborhood and recite Dr. Seuss for people, unprompted. I'd ring your doorbell and I'd hit you with a few pages of one fish, two fish, redfish, bluefish, and then I'd fall off your porch. That was my vibe. at four, five, six, seven, eight years old. That was my vibe as I grew up in the 80s,

which was a great decade in which to grow up if you were constantly actively trying to get songs stuck in your head. Did you know that the video for Karma Chameleon, the 1983 Culture Club hit Karma Chameleon? Did you know that the Karma Chameleon video announces immediately that it is set in Mississippi in 1870?

Whose idea was that? I'll tell you who didn't come up with that idea if you take my meaning. Do you think Culture Club were like, we want to set this video on a riverboat in Mississippi in maybe we're thinking around 1860 and someone was like, no, no, you will do no such thing. You will set it in 1870 minimum. In truth, the Karma Chameleon video was filmed on Desboro Island in Weybridge, which is not in Mississippi. Excuse me, I got distracted by the quite disconcerting video for Karma Chameleon when all I wanted to say is that probably Karma Chameleon was stuck in my giant five-year-old head at some point.

And also Boy George from Culture Club insisted that he did not deliberately rip off Handyman with all that, comma, comma, comma, action. Sure, I believe that. I actually do. If we're talking about me at five years old, I am morally obligated to bring up the cars. I'm not going to look it up, but I'm guessing that I've already told you like 20 times that at five years old,

I would listen to the first cars album, self-titled from 1978, my best friend's girl, just what I needed, moving in stereo, etc. Still my favorite album of all time. As a little kid, I'd listened to the first cars album, and I'd run in circles around, my living room while clutching the vinyl album sleeve to the first cars album. I called it

cars paper. I eventually tore the cars paper so much that my parents bought another copy of the first cars album just for the cars paper. I told you this 20 times already probably. But me running in circles listening to the cars while clutching my car's paper, that's a useful visual, physical manifestation of the loop stuck in my head. Right? Adorable. Unprompted, This one got stuck back of my head just now. Major Tom, parentheses, coming home. The 1983 hit by Peter Schilling, the super German synth pop guy. Shout out David Bowie also.

One time when I was a little kid, we were driving home late at night, and I was in the back seat, possibly a car seat, staring at my ghostly reflection in the car window framed by the pitch black suburban Missouri night as it whizzed passed. And I imagined that I was on MTV, that I was in the video for Major Tom coming home. And the video was just my giant head reflected in the car window singing in the song. I had a weird vibe as a kid. This song got stuck in my head a lot, but different parts of it. Not just the chorus, not just the lyrics even. I think this song was secretly instrumental in teaching me that the loop could be instrumental. Just that part looped in my head for three weeks.

That part of Major Tom coming home is extra super German. Sometimes the song itself is super repetitive. Sometimes I just make the loop in my head super repetitive. So I was trying to think of the first time as a kid that I had the conscious thought. Man, this song is super repetitive. It's the same thing over and over and over. And here's my best guess. I got my mind said, I know.

Got my mind set on you. I got my mind set. Got my mind set on you. The jaunty 1987 hit by George Harrison, formerly of the Beatles. That's the chorus. The chorus is the same line four times. Plenty of songs. The chorus is the same line four times.

Am I just being rude here? Is Got My Mind Set on you, especially? Repetitive. Can anyone else back me up on this? This song is just six words long. This song is just six words long. This song is just six words long. This song is just six words long. God bless you, Weird Al Yankovic, for backing me up on that.

From his 1988 album, even worse. That is weird Al Yankovic with this song's just six words long. He's almost cheating. It's only six words long if you use the contraction, right? So not this song is just six words long. That's seven words. But this song's just six words long. That always bothered me a little.

But not too much. God bless you, Hal, truly. But wait, somebody else backs me up with data, with science, with data science. So this website, the pudding, the URL is literally pudding. Cool. I didn't know you could do that. This website, The Pudding, does visual essays, cultural data analysis, that sort of thing. In 2017, this dude, Colin Morris did a project for the pudding with the headline, Are Pop Lyrics Getting More Repetitive in which he analyzed a data set of 15,000 songs that charted on the Billboard Hot 100 between 1958 and 2017?

Colin, analyze the lyrics to those 15,000 songs using the Lempel Ziv algorithm. Lempel-Hyphin Ziv. Yeah, forget it. If you think your eyes just glazed over, you should see mine. I'm going to do you a favor and not even attempt a big but remarkably empty-headed layman's description of the Lempel Ziv algorithm. It compresses repeated sections of the text and then it forget it. The graphics look really pretty. I trust this guy.

Real quick, just to answer the question, are pop lyrics getting more repetitive? As of 2017, the most repetitive year in pop music history was 2014. And the most repetitive song of 2014 was turned down for what by DJ Snake and Lil John. That's funny. The pudding breaks it down by decade. The top 10 most repetitive songs of each decade. And George Harrison's Got My Mind Set on You is the third most repetitive song of the 80s. Number two, funky. by Lips Incorporated, or perhaps that's Lips, Inc. From 1980. And the number one most repetitive pop song of the 1980s, ooh, I had this tape. Pump it, pump it, pump it, pump it, pump it. I had this tape. Pump up the jam by Technotronic from their 1989 full-length debut, Pump Up the Jam, which I had on tape.

Technotronic were super Belgian. Ooh, this is dance music. electronic music. Is this techno? Techno is right in the band's name. I think this might be techno. Are we doing this? Are we doing the top 11 most repetitive songs of the 90s? According to data science, according to the pudding. I think we might be doing this. Look out. Top 11 most repetitive songs of the 90s. Here we go. Number 11. Sorry. Sorry. It's science. It's data. Sorry. I remember when the prodigy were like,

Oh, smack my bitch up is just British slang for Up and Atom or whatever. Yikes. Good times. Number 10. Ooh, this song rules so hard. Touch It by Monifa. From her 1998 album, MoHagony, Mo Apostrophe Hogany. That song rules so hard.

I was out walking once late at night. I was on one of my patented semi-exercise oriented dad walks. And Touch It came on this 90s R&B play. playlist I was listening to, and I sped up immediately. I developed Sonic the Hedgehog legs when Sonic's legs are just a super fast, blurry oval. The Roadrunner from Looney Tunes does it too. That was me when I heard this song. I still remember exactly where I was in my neighborhood when that song came on that one time. Great song. Let's not question the almighty Lempel Ziv algorithm here, but touch it never struck me as ultra repetitive. But I will say that this song loves its own chorus.

and repeats the chorus repeatedly. Touch it has verses and a bridge also, but I would describe that bridge and those verses as grudging. You can just tell Monifa was like, can the whole song be just the chorus and the record label people were like, no.

So Monifa was like, fine, but I'm doing as few verses as possible as quickly and dismissively as possible so I can do the chorus again. Great song. Number nine, David Bowie, I'm afraid of Americans. from his 1997 album Earthling.

This song's got the video where Trent Resner from Nine Inch Nails is stalking David Bowie. I hope this comes up again, but just in case this doesn't come up again, David Bowie spent a remarkable percentage of the 90s explicitly trying to sound more like nine inch nails,

and it kicked ass. Obviously, David Bowie is a huge, huge, huge influence on literally everyone ever, Trent Resner very much included, but I love that influence loop. I really dug that the influence started going both ways. They toured together, Bowie and Nine Inch Nails. I missed it.

That was fucking stupid. I'm afraid of Americans never struck me as ultra repetitive either, actually. I'm starting to have my doubts about the almighty Lempel Ziv algorithm. Number eight, never mind, the algorithm's fine. This one I fucking get. Somebody asked me recently, is there any 90 song that you refuse to do on the show? And my honest answer was no, because if there was a song I really, really didn't want to do that I refused to do, then my refusal to do it would paradoxically become so fascinating to me that I'd end up doing it.

You know? Because that's how it works nowadays in my giant head full of holes. Cotton Eye Joe by Rednecks with an X from 1994. Is this techno? Don't answer that. Cotton eye Joe is forcibly ejected through one hole in my head. but craftily sneaks back into my head via another hole in my head. I don't care for that song.

Number seven. Superhero. The 1997 Eurodance smash that I've definitely heard of before by the Danish group Days. If you pronounce the word days differently in Denmark, if it's like Daze or something, then keep me out of it. This shit is extra super Danish. I know that much. Number six, Jocelyn Enriquez. A little bit of ecstasy from her 1997 album Jocelyn, though notably it also appears on the soundtrack to the Oscar-winning 1998 drama A Night at the Roxbury, starring Sir Anthony Hopkins and Daniel Day Lewis.

That songs are a real good time. You may have noticed that the higher we move up this list of repetitive 90 songs, the more algorithmically repetitive we get, the more dominant. dance music gets. Ooh, look at this. Number five and number four are two different versions of the same song. You know what? Fuck it. Talk about a lot of alaulpairena.

Talk about adorable. Yes, indeed. the modest 1993 original version of Los Del Rio's Macarena. Number five is just slightly less repetitive than the Blockbuster in 1995 Bayside Boys remix of Macarena. Number four, let's not get into all that again, though. Wrap it up, Rob. Number three. Now, this is interesting.

Another question I get from time to time is, what is the single 90sist song? of the 90s, not necessarily the biggest or best, but just the 90s song that sounds and feels the most like the 90s. And I forget all my previous answers in part because I have a different answer every time. But this time, even though no one asked me, the 90sist song of the 90s is send me on my way by Rusted Root. I can smell this song. I don't mean that pejoratively, but I do mean that literally. Send me on my way from 1994. I think we can all agree that 1994 is the 90sist year of the 90s. I will not be elaborating on any of these opinions. Number two. All right. Here we go. Here we go. You know what? Hold on a second. Give me a second. Put a pin in that. We'll be back.

Okay. Sorry, I got to wrap this up. And now the number one most repetitive song. of the 90s according to science and I didn't guess this but I'm guessing that you guessed it. My name is Rob Horvilla. This is the 99th episode of 60 songs that explain the 90s in this week. We are discussing Around the World by Daft Punk from their 1997 debut album, Homework. And I suppose the first thing to say is that I forget just the 90s. Around the world is apparently the single most repetitive song in the point. Puddings Lempel Ziv algorithm-based analysis of 15,000 charting pop songs between 1958 and 2017.

I just reread the detailed explanation of how the Lempel Ziv algorithm works. No. I'm sorry, but no, I will biff it all to hell if I attempt to explain this to you. This isn't fucking radio lab. The only lyrics to the song around the world are around the world, around the world. Don't overthink it. It's repetitive. Okay.

All right. my sense of things. There's two ways to come at this. The cool way and the uncool way. So what do we think? Yeah, I know. Okay, uncool way it is. Say hello to Fat Boy Slims, the Rockefeller Skank,

which happens to be the second most repetitive song, according to the pudding's Lempel Ziv algorithm-based analysis of 15,000 charting pop songs between 1958 and 2017. Those are pretty much the only lyrics to the Rockefeller Skank. Okay. The uncool way to come at Daft Punk is to come to them the way I came to them in real time, in 1997, as a 19-year-old melonhead raised on alternative rock who is now attempting to terrorize my unsuspecting, bucolic Midwestern, rusted root-smelling campus as a DJ on college radio. I came to Daft Punk via the extremely uncool music magazine phenomenon known as Eve. Electronica. Do do do do. Let me actually read you a brief excerpt of a 1997 interview with Daft Punk in Melody Maker,

the British weekly music magazine Melody Maker. Here we go. Quote, American White Rock is dead. Everyone knows it. The varnished zombies going through their croaky cod grunge motions on MTV know it. ironically Kurt Cobain is more alive now than any of these clueless combos will ever be end quote sheesh that's unnecessary cod hyphen grunge that's cod meaning phony so fake grunge not cod like the fish or cod as in cod piece as in the crotular region this shit is rude furthermore quote MTV knows the game is up too, which is why they're in the process of ditching spade loads of their 120 minutes left field coverage and courting the new wave of what they've cutely termed electronica.

Go into Virgin Megastore on L.A.'s sunset strip and display stand after display stand is blaring the wares of the Chemical Brothers, the Prodigy, Underworld, even more Cheba, at Bien-Sour. daft punk end quote that last part is french every magazine i'm reading in 1997 and also every magazine i'm not reading because where the hell am i supposed to get melody maker in 1997 in fucking ohio every magazine everywhere is insisting to me that rock is dead and i've got to like electronica now and fat boy slim aka dj and one-man band norman cook initially struck me as dance music specifically designed to enrapture rock and mainstream pop enthusiasts with relatively little previous experience with dance music, the gateway drug.

Dance music for dummies. Norman Cook is already famous and beloved and legit. He's not the dummy in his construction. I am, but I could not shake the unsettling feeling that Fat Boy Slim was designed to pander to dummies like me specifically. This quite repetitive song is called Michael. Jackson from the first Fat Boy Slim record. Better

Living Through Chemistry from 1996. Those aren't the only lyrics to this song. FYI. There we go. Electronica, which is indeed a cute and also stupendously dorky name for anything, is obviously one of these hot new genres

that the artists themselves want nothing to do with. Nobody classified as Electronica would be caught dead referring to themselves as Electronica. Norman Cook preferred the term big beat. And it's not that he's pandering to me, but he is actively trying to get lunkheads like me into dance music.

I picture myself as a giant-headed baby in a high chair, and Fat Boy Slim's got some dance music on a spoon, and he's going, woo-hoo, here comes the airplane, until I'm delighted enough that he can cram the dance music into my mouth. Fat Boy Slim's whole value proposition is that dance, music can be rock and roll. It can be punk rock. It can be jock jams for dance floors. It can be jock jams that aren't safe for stadiums and also aren't safe for work. That's pretty repetitive. That song, of course, is called In Heaven from the 1998 Fat Boy Slim album, You've Come a Long way, baby,

also featuring cuddlier and more famous fat boy slim songs, such as the Rockefeller Skank, and also, ah, yes, this one. And also praise you. And I'll play that shit. Sure, I'm 17, 18, 19. I'm a college radio DJ, and I'm there to play my quote-unquote alternative rock, right?

I want to play my bill to spill, my sunny day real estate, my U-2, even though U-2's getting pretty weird, etc. And I'm not morally opposed to playing electronic music. music, dance music, whatever. I don't have a conscious disco demolition night mentality. But my extensive experience with Technotronic aside, I am relatively new to dance music. I'm trepidacious. And in my conception, big beat as a subgenre, as colossal and blaring and willfully obnoxious as this music can be, in real time, this music does feel like it was paradoxically designed to soothe me. See,

dance music can be rock and roll. If you sample the bejesus out of Van Halen, for example, that was Apollo 440. The second biggest musical group from Liverpool with their 1997 jam ain't talking about dub. Do you know these guys, the propeller heads?

The propeller heads, the English duo, all of these people are English. How about I just tell you if someone's not English? The propeller heads, the obviously English maximalist dance music. duo who literally put out an album in 1998 called Decks and Drums and Rock and Roll. The album covers the two dudes walking away from a giant fireball.

Like they're in an action movie, I've always wanted to do that. This song's called Bang On with an exclamation point. That's an English expression, bang on, if I'm not mistaken. And I never am. Tremendously soothing. We played this propeller heads record a lot on our college radio station. and my buddy Jeff and I got super into the last song on decks and drums and rock and roll.

It's called You Want It Back, featuring the Jungle Brothers, the extremely rad and not English rap group, the Jungle Brothers, because this big beat shit works on trepidacious rap super fans as well. It's good advice. I love this song, You Want It Back,

and I went looking for it. recently and I couldn't find it on the album immediately. And that's when I found out that this song does not appear on the original decks and drums and rock and roll album. It's only on the American version. Yes, yes, pander to me, England. Convince me personally that dance music is real music. Sneak familiar American rock and rap stars and various American references into extremely English electronic music. Here comes the airplane. Bring me this guy.

Yes. Bring me breathe by the prodigy. Bring me the prodigies way less problematic songs. And back when we did a whole episode on the prodigy on Firestarter, we talked through this. Electronica stars is the new rock stars. The Crystal Method and Underworld and the Chemical Brothers. I get super into the Chemical Brothers at 17.

because in 1997 they put out that record, Dig Your Own Hole. And that song, Block Rock and Beats kicks ass. And also, I do believe one of the Gallagher brothers from Oasis is skulking around somewhere. I'll tell you that it's just too bad. Setting Son, that song kicks ass as well. I always forget which Gallagher, brother, that is. It's no.

Great. The whole point of all this pandering to me personally is that I buy Dig Your Own Hole because the guy from Oasis sings one of the songs. but then, if I vibe hard enough with all the other songs, a couple months down the road, I'll have this stuck in my head instead. That song's called it Doesn't Matter. And if all this goes to plan,

all this pandering to me specifically, and if I do become in some provisional, casual way, an electronic music guy, then perhaps on the evening of Wednesday, July 7th, 1999, at a concert at the Nautica Pavilion in Cleveland, Ohio, beautiful views of the flats. If you're familiar with the flats, Cleveland's luxurious downtown

nightlife district. The flats, there's boats and shit. I believe there's a hooters nearby. Perhaps I will attend a three-band bill that personifies this blurring of the rock star and the scare quotes rock star. Band number one,

the low fidelity all stars. Yes, battle flag from 1998. I got that. rad shit stuck in my head all the time. Second band on the bill, Orbital. The rude codpiece melody maker writer was not wrong that MTV was shifting from 120 minutes alternative rock to scare quotes electronica, as exemplified by their new electronica

video show AMP. You remember AMP? You remember the amp soundtrack? I do. And as a mopey 19 year old, I'd feel extra sophisticated moping to this shit. Luminous harpsichore. just tremendously sophisticated moping undertaken by me whilst listening to the box by Orbital, some of the best moping of my career.

And finally, headlining, two sweet dudes who are not from England, I'll have you know. These guys are ours. The Crystal Method are from Las Vegas, as indicated by the title of their hit 1997 album, Vegas. This song is called Keep Hope Alive. And what I remember about this show is the two Crystal Method dudes are on stage behind giant banks of gear, right? Samplers and keyboards or whatever. And the keyboard stands are bendy and in fact detachable so the dudes can move their shit around to the crowd's unending delights because that's how rock stars get down. And at the climactic moment in the song Keep Hope Alive, one of the Crystal Method dudes

falls to the floor with his feet up in the air and his feet, in fact, pressing against his keyboard in this moment of euphoric rock star release. And it was not necessarily the coolest shit I'd ever seen because trust me, I'd seen plenty of other cool shit by that point, but it was still pretty fucking cool. Let me ask you a question. Is this all leading up to daft punk or isn't it? Are daft punk a part of this lineage or not? Are daft punk's scarecrank? Quotes Electronica, do you consider the Crystal Method and the Chemical Brothers and Underworld

and the prodigy and Fat Boy Slim to be among Daft Punk's peers? This is why this was the uncool way to get to Daft Punk. The dance music 101 for alternative rock and knuckleheads way is not the cool way to get there. Can we at least

try the cool way as unnatural as it may sound coming from me? Okay, thank you. Let's try this. This is the kind of shit I'm into in 1993. Here we got the band Darling, a fuzzy Parisian rock trio named after a Beach Boy song, and consisting of Tomas Bang Alter, Guy Manuel de Homem Cristo, and Laurent Brokowitz. That song is called Darling as well. It's anyone's guess which one of these three dudes is responsible for that bitchin guitar tone. Darling put out like two songs on Stereo Labs label. That's

pretty cool, and Darling receive, for their efforts, a dismissive review in the weekly British music magazine, Melody Maker. Specifically, the review infamously dismisses Darling as daft punky thrash. Rock criticism-wise in retrospect, this of course is one of the most well-known mean reviews written by anybody about anything in the 1990s. Darling breakup. Larent goes off and joins another semi-fuzzy Parisian rock band called Phoenix. And Phoenix don't start blowing up until the 2000s, and they don't really blow up until like 2009. But for your reference, here's what Phoenix are up to in 1999. That song's called Heat Wave, and I think our buddy Laurent is going to do just fine. Meanwhile, Guy Manuel and Thomas form a new group called Daft Punk,

who debut fairly quietly in 1994 with a tune called The New Wave, long before it is clear to everyone that that is what they are. I appreciate how mildly abrasive that is. Musically, Daft Punk come from a mildly abrasive background, a DIY background, a punk in spirit background, a rock with ambitions beyond rock background. In that rude codpiece 1997 Melodymaker interview with Daft Punk, Guy Manuel talks up the 1991 primal scream album,

Screamadelica, as, quote, one of the albums first to set off an explosion in our heads. End quote. Screamadelica mixed chill psychedelic rock with house music and acid house. And the pretty druggie and super English dance rock subgenre known as baggy. Like the pants. It's super English. Can I tell you real quick about the time I got this stuck in my head for a long weekend?

This is the primal scream song, don't fight it, comma, feel it. And I took my family with three kids on a road trip to a lakehouse in Michigan. And one of those kids is a baby. And it drives chaos the whole time, what with all the snacks and bathroom breaks and noisy kids and on wee. And I've got Screamadelica playing at a reasonable volume in the minivan. And I get just that little chirping sound. Doot, do, doot, doot, stuck in my head for 72 hours as I shift into hardcore dad mode. All that child wrangling and minivan driving and I'll turn this minivan around threatening the whole time.

Doot do do do do do. It was awesome. I was operating at maximum dad efficiency the whole time. I am not going to check with my wife to see if she thinks I was operating at maximum dad efficiency at that time because that would ruin the illusion. So maybe Daft Punk start here, somewhere around here. Screamadelica sets off an explosion in their heads, but screamodelica cannot define or contain that explosion. In Melody Maker, Tomas, who's like 22 at this point, he talks about how quickly Daft Punk grew disillusioned with rock in any form. Quote, maybe when we were 16 and at gigs, Dinosaur Jr., primal scream, rock was okay.

But then at 17, we looked around and thought, what is the point of the... these guys doing nothing. The gigs were full of people doing nothing and we felt we were wasting our time so young in this kind of place, end quote, meaning Paris, early to mid-90s Paris, where house music is much more prominent and disco, never dead, never demolished is much more prominent. And there ain't much grunge or even cod grunge happening anywhere. The next daft punk single out in 1995 is called defunct and here's your new wave i tell people that episode to episode i pick the songs for this show arbitrarily because i do uh but maybe i don't ever think of that maybe i have an ingenious years long well thought out master plan with lots of cool deliberate song to song

episode to episode continuity yeah it's possible let's go with that actually tomah talking about defunc to the Swedish magazine Pop No. 23, not available in Ohio, this magazine. Tomas says, and I quote, it was around the time Warren G's regulate was released. And we wanted to make some sort of gangster rap and tried to murk our sounds as much as possible. However, no one has ever compared it to hip-hop.

We've heard that the drums sound like Queen in the Clash. The melody is reminiscent of Italian disco-jibald. Giorgio Moroder, and the synthesizers sound like electro and thousands of other comparisons. No one agrees with us that it sounds like hip-hop, end quote. Ha! I don't agree with DaFunk either about the hip-hop thing, but more importantly, see? Regulate was the last episode. Cool continuity.

I got a master plan. This song sounded awesome on college radio, even if I had barely any context for it. DeFunk is structured like a rock song, like a pop song, like a stadium anthem. DeFunk has cool, deliberate internal continuity. The author and critic Michelangelo Matos in his 2015 book, The Underground is Massive, How Electronic Dance Music Concord America. He writes, DeFunk was a bombshell, not merely a French house record, one that sounded and felt French even as it was clearly indebted to Chicago.

the birthplace of house music. He goes on. It was the emerging French touch DJ style, the club-based house approach of DJs like Martin Solvig, David Getta and Nick Nice, full of disco loops going in and out of oral focus after being sent through whooshing low-pass filters manifested on a recording. DeFunk worked like a pop record, building and cresting and layering with verse chorus logic far beyond the simple filter disco, of much mid-90s house. End quote. Can I tell you two things?

One thing makes me sound very cool, and then another thing makes me sound like the biggest dork you ever heard of in your life. Okay, the cool thing first. If we're talking the original 1995 single version of defunct, I prefer the original B-side. A quite pleasingly abrasive acid house song

called Roland and Scratchen. It's pretty cool of me how much I like that song Rowan and Scratchin, right? Okay, the other thing. The mortifying, uncool, biggest dork you ever heard of thing. When people write about disco,

any era of disco, you often see the phrase four on the floor beats, so it's in four-four time with a kick drum going boom, boom, boom, boom, one, two, three, four, four on the floor. But I personally avoid this phrase, when writing or speaking or thinking because I'm still very embarrassed by the fact that the first few times I encountered this phrase, four on the floor, or in fact, perhaps the first several thousand times I encountered this phrase, I thought four on the floor meant on your hands and knees on the dance floor. And I was like, well, that's inappropriate dance floor behavior. Oh my God. I am not entirely convinced that four on the floor.

floor doesn't mean on your hands and knees. It would be just like the elitist global dance music community to spend decades now conspiring to embarrass me by making me think I'm wrong about that. Get your hands and knees off that dance floor. It's dirty. There's your whooshing filters going in and out of oral focus. Daft Punk's debut album, Homework, comes out in early 1997. Pick your favorite song. lots of options don't be embarrassed though if you pick around the world here's your building and cresting and layering with verse chorus logic okay lyrically around the world consists of the phrase around the world repeated 144 times that's an even number because it's repeated in pairs we are quite early in the broader decades long discography wide now mythic daft punk arc right the robot heads

the mystique, the more machine than man, lore, the fucking Coachella Pyramid, the quick jump to their best album, that's Discovery from 2001, in the longer and steadier as sense to their biggest album. That's Random Access Memories from 2013. Here in 1997,

on homework, on around the world, the vast majority of what we talk about when we talk about daft punk ain't happened yet. So let's talk about the Around the World video, which not so subtly preps all the dance music neophytes out there for the rest of the daft punk arc. The Around the World video is directed by super French pop surrealist Michelle Gondry, future director of the 2004 romantic drama Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,

which I saw in the theater on a date with my future wife, who afterward was like, are we going to end up like that? And I said, baby, that relationship is not analogous to our relationship. The Around the World video is a Busby, Berkeley-style choreographed extravaganza with groups of four dancers, the B-boys with baby heads on their heads, the skeletons, the mummies, the swimming ladies, the robots. And they're all dancing on a stage built to resemble a vinyl record. And each quartet is acting out, is physically manifesting a different element of the song. I realize this is not analysis.

This is just what's happening. So right here, Mummies as the high hat. B-boys as the base, robots as the snare. The B-boys are the best part, right? High stepping down the stairs in time to the descending baseline. That part visually gets stuck in my head from time to time, the baseline down the stairs. And that's when I'm at my most efficient. And so for anyone out there, in 1997 with a super rock-centric mindset,

a conscious or subconscious disco demolition night bias, an inclination to dismiss disco house, dance music, electronic music, whatever as not real music because nobody's got an acoustic guitar and nobody's whining about their ex-girlfriend. The Around the World video is invaluable for the way it's subconsciously, but also very consciously shows you

how physical, how human, every part of this song really is. I do think that even if dance music, you don't know shit about shit, and maybe especially if you don't know shit about shit, when this video first hits you. And thus this video is legitimately foundational for you, the around the world video can change the way you hear all dance music going forward, any country, any type, any era.

Because going forward, you subconsciously or consciously assign physical characteristics, dance moves, live humans, physically dancing dance moves to every element of every song you hear. The mummies are taking the lead on that new descending, bluerblower melody there, but the B-boys, the swimmers, the skeletons, the robots, everyone's starting to dance and sync. This is the era of the prestige music video director, those fancy DVD collections we all had, the director's label series. Michelle Gondry's videos, he also worked with the Chemical Brothers,

Spike Jones's videos, he did praise you for Fat Boy Slim, Chris Cunningham's videos, he worked with AFX Twin. People who already know tons of shit about shit where electronic music was concerned didn't need any of this multimedia crossover, this handholding.

This rock is dead, so go find something else music magazine spurring. But as entry points, to entire vibrant genres of music go around the world was a goddamn glorious entry point. Right this second, I feel compelled for some reason to play you another super abrasive track off homework called, and this is a total coincidence, probably, rock and roll. I am not very efficient when that's the loop in my head, I have to say. That's when dad has to go lie down.

Homework overall is harsher and noisier and punk. year than around the world would suggest. But around the world does lead us climatically to the single greatest piece of music either member of daft punk will ever be involved with. And I think you'll believe me when I say, I consider doing the whole episode about this song instead and treating daft punk as an afterthought,

but that would be trolling. But yeah, anyway, hit it, fellas. In 1998, Tomas from dafunk hooked up the DJ and remixer Alan Brax and also the singer Benjamin Diamond. to form the group Stardust, who put out exactly one song. And I'm almost positive that in the ultra-exclusive category of bands that only put out one song, this is the best song out of all the songs from one-song bands. Hit it harder, fellas.

Music sounds better with you. I love this song with all my dorky heart. Not that any of these other songs by anybody require any context to enjoy, but music sounds better with you is extra enjoyable and extra doesn't require context to enjoy. The author and critic Simon Reynolds in another essential book about dance music, 1998's Energy Flash, a journey through rave music and dance culture. He describes music sounds better with you as the defining filter disco anthem with an astonishing woozy-ozy male vocal and cocaine crisp chic style

rhythm guitar and a snatch of strings. Simon also adds, the audio equivalent of a glitter ball. Music sounds better with you was widely interpreted as a love song to the Mitsubishi brand of E. End quote. That's E is in ecstasy and the Mitsubishi brand of E as in not the car. Never mind that. However you picture me, I'm certain that you can't picture anything as clearly as you can picture me not doing drugs. It's enough to know that in 1998, music sounds better with you was one of my favorite songs. And around the world was one of the songs that made that possible. And around the world opened me up to a vast and daunting and exhilarating new universe of loops that get stuck in my head. You know this French electronic duo Cassius? They put out a rad album called 1999 in 1999.

Last weekend, I did some really efficient and satisfying yard work with a song called Foxy stuck in my head. Two X's in Foxy, but the song justifies like 10 X's. Just me all cutting down tree branches with a chainsaw on a stick. My mother-in-law got me for Christmas with that super funky don't loop stuck in my head. Fantastic. This is not the universe I dreamt of. Back when I was running in circles in my living room, listening to the cars when I was four years old, I am eternally grateful to daft punk for dreaming me a far better universe. Our guest today is Ryan Dombel,

features editor of Pitchfork and creator of Over Under the greatest web video series ever made. He is a daft punk scholar and a Renaissance man. Ryan, welcome. Hi, hi, great to be here. Big fan, big fan of the show. Likewise, likewise,

it's great to talk to you. You told me that you bought daff punks around the world on Kisingle and that Kisingle now sells on eBay for $150. So first of all, do you still have it? I don't know, actually. If I do, it's at my mom's house somewhere squirled away.

Yeah. I need to check that out. But I have a update, a price, a market watch update. Okay. Please. I looked at Discogs after we talked. And it's only worth. $40. Oh, no.

So it's really gone down in the last 12 hours since I sent you that email. Or the person on eBay is just really gouging. I'm not sure. Has there been like daft punk news of some sort that has affected the price that dramatically? That's a dramatic percentage drop that I can't calculate right now. But that's bad, I think. I know. I know.

Yeah. You said it was the first piece of electronic music you ever bought. What led you to around the world? What were you mostly listening to at the time? And did this purchase feel momentous as your first piece of electronic music? I don't think it felt momentous necessarily. I was 15. And it was just a matter of my taste going beyond like aerosmiths get a grip or whatever.

It's a great album. It's a great album. Or counting pros. whatever is like hot on like alternative rock radio at the time was what I was into or pop, you know, like ace of bass and stuff like that. Sure. Yeah, I feel like the reason I bought that single at, at the wall in Walt Whitman Mall on Long Island is the music video.

Like it's 100% why I was made aware of death punk. Maybe they were on the radio eventually, but I feel like. my first exposure was the video, which just kind of blew my teenage mind. I don't think I'd ever seen anything quite like it. Yeah. I always remember those DVDs they were putting out was Spike Jones, Michelle Gondry, and I think Chris Cunningham, right? Like that was the era of like all the Bjork videos, you know,

like all the Weaser videos, like Apex Twin. Like this was like a secret golden age, one of the last golden ages, really, for music videos. it might actually be on MTV. Yeah, 100%. And I had all those DVDs of like the director's label, I think, is what it was called. Of like they collected the, you know, Spike Jones's videos. And I was thinking back actually about this video, which Michelle Gondry directed. And I think maybe my first exposure to it was on this MTV show called 12 Angry Viewers.

Do you remember this? I do. So this is like. this was a show where they just got 12 randos around Times Square probably to come into the MTV studios and they'd show them three videos of the week and they would talk about which one was the best one, which one sucked. And honestly, looking back, that was probably one of my first exposures to like the idea of music criticism as well, which is, you know, for better or worse. But I saw that someone ranked this show

as one of the worst shows in MTV history. But it actually was really meaningful to me because I was looking at the Wikipedia of the show and some of the videos that won were Bjork Bachelorette, Apex Twin, Come to Daddy

and Deaf Punks around the world. Like, these are three foundational artists for me. Great taste. Yeah, yeah. I mean, the jurors were, I guess they kind of knew what they were doing. on this show. So yeah, I think that was my first exposure. And, and yeah, I was like, I need to, I need to have this. Yeah. I came to Def Punk through college radio and AMP on MTV, if you

remember, and, like, through the very dorky, like, very American electronica craze, right? Like, just spin and Rolling Stone and everybody is suddenly pushing the chemical brothers on me or the prodigy or Daft Punk. Did you see them that way? Did you see them more specifically as part of French touch? Or is that, or is it still too? early for all of that for you. I think I probably saw them a little bit as part of the Chemical Brother. You know, like what you're talking about, the electronica. I definitely didn't know what French touch was or anything like that.

Or I didn't know anything about the, all the, you know, Detroit techno artists and like the Chicago House artists that they're referencing on their album homework. I didn't know anything about that either. So I think part of their philosophy at the time and really throughout their career was to, you know, acknowledge their influences in a kind of, in a kind of like nerdy, nerdy way, a fun nerdy way. And yeah, they definitely did that on homework. And yeah, they did it explicitly with this song called Teachers. Teachers.

Yeah. Which is just a bunch of shoutouts to their influences essentially. And, and yeah, I mean, I wish I could say that I listened to death punk in 1997 and then like, I got really into Carl Craig, you know, and like, but like that didn't happen. It just made me kind of dabble in the more popular stuff like Chemical Brothers, like Fat Boyce and stuff like that. Yeah, I was going to ask you like what your next single was, you know, or where you go from there. Like, what's the second piece of electronic music that you ever buy? Yeah, I think it might have been Chemical Brothers setting Sun, which features Noel Gallagher. Yeah.

Which is a monster, monster track. Like, really holds up. I listened to it recently. And, you know, I was a really big Brit pop band. Like, I loved Oasis. So, you know, that in a weird way, I feel like Noel Gallagher has really looked upon is this kind of like, like stodgy traditionalists now. But by doing that song with the Chemical Brothers,

like I feel like it opened up my mind to electronic music and probably a lot of other people at the time, which is cool, you know, this is cool to think about. No, I completely agree with that. When I think about like an album from this era, like Dig Your Own Hole is the one for me. I'll respect the homework, you know, even the Prodigy.

Like I loved those records, but Dig Your Own Hole is the one that I can put on now and listen to beginning to end. and like, this is way better than I even thought it was, you know? Yeah, it's so good. So good. When you did hear homework in its entirety for the first time, like, what did you make of it? You know, it's not like around the world is like a huge anomaly or a fake out or something,

but a lot of it is like gnarlier and dirtier than around the world. Yeah. I mean, at the time, I was probably kind of disappointed because it wasn't as poppy. you know, it was more, you know, grittier, kind of more traditional, like, in line with what was, would actually be playing in, like, in a club. And I was never, like, a club person. I was more of a headphones person or radio person, like, is more than, like, a club person. So, so, yeah, I was probably maybe a little bit disappointed. I feel like my, you know, my entry points to the album were the singles and my favorite songs are the same.

singles, like, I'm not, I don't know, I'm not like cool guying it. It's like, you know, like, actually my favorite song is a random track. Like it's, it's defunct. Like, it's a, yeah, it's around the world. So, so, yeah, it's, uh, yeah, I think it probably made a little bit of an impression on me just like, you know, open my mind to these other styles of music. But maybe not as big of an impression that, uh, that it, that it like should have. I don't know. I don't know. You're 15. I would go easy on yourself. Yeah, sure. Where is, where is music? You're welcome. I absolve you. Where is music sounds better with you in your personal pantheon? Are you a, for me, that's probably my favorite daft punk affiliated song. Like, I love that song more than any one daft punk song. Interesting. You can disagree. It's fine. It's up there. I do enjoy the song. you know, whenever it comes on and I've always loved it. But I think for me, I really do like the kind of conceptual or, you know, the myth of daft punk, like everything that goes along with it. Sure. So that's like, that elevates some of the, you know, some of the deaf punk singles and my

favorite tracks by them. I know that what they were doing with Stardust and like music sounds better. with you, I think that they were trying, they were consciously being like a one-hit wonder, or at least once they hit, once the hit happened, they consciously didn't do anything else together, which is cool, I guess. But like, you know, I respect that.

And it is a cool idea. But, you know, I'm attracted to the whole, the whole mythology of like a great, a great artist. So it's hard for me to not think of it as like a little bit. more slight. Yeah. Given that mythology, I am curious about the way

that homework has aged, given everything that came after. You know, like Discovery in 2001 and then Coachella in 2006 and then random access memories. Like, do all those accomplishments like make homework feel more modest to you now

or feel like an album by a different group in some sense? I think it is more modest, but not by a different group. Because I think that, and I was, and I was actually looking back on my transcript when I interviewed them around random access memories. And they were saying that, Tomas was saying that, you know, the philosophy of homework as far as like paying tribute to the artists that they love and just basically airing out like their influences and having fun with that really does run through like all the way to random access memories. But like the difference is the differences like whereas on.

something around the world, they might have been paying tribute to Sheik, or, you know, like that kind of disco anthem. On random access memories, they just called... Yeah, exactly. They just got the guys who made the albums. So, I don't necessarily think, like, one is better than the other. Like, one strategy is better than the other.

It's really more about access and, you know, and resources, I suppose. You know, for homework, they couldn't, they wouldn't be able to call like, Nile Rogers for homework. He'd be like, who the fuck are you? You know, like, why is this French person calling me?

Perhaps, maybe he would have been much nicer. But, but yeah, I think it was a matter of resources, but the philosophy of, yeah, paying tribute and emulating their heroes does seem consistent. Homework doesn't sound like it cost a million dollars. It's still a great.

record, but it didn't necessarily have a million dollar. Yeah, exactly. I was going to ask you what they, you know, it wasn't the focal point of your conversation, but what they thought of homework now. Like there's plenty of artists. I always think of like radio head, et cetera, who sort of look down on their earliest work, you know, or feel like it's, you know, they progress from it. They're past that now. Like, they have affection for it, but it's not their best stuff and they don't pretend like it is. Do you think, you have a sense about deaf punk think about this record, like be that issue of like going from paying homage to your heroes to playing with them. Right. No, I don't, I don't think it is like a radio head, you know,

where they kind of shunned a lot of their early material for their first album at least. I think they, I feel, I feel like, I don't think we talked about specifically, but the impression I get is that they, yeah, hold it dear. And I think maybe perhaps part of that is because it does fall in line with, you know, everything that they love. It's, you know, that consistency. But another thing, another reason why I say that is because I remember seeing them on the pyramid tour in the late 2000s.

And, you know, they mixed in a lot of, a lot of the homework tracks, like on that tour. And, you know, those were a lot of the best moments of the show. So it definitely didn't get the impression that, you know, they were like, oh, you know, we did that. or, you know, we're embarrassed by that. If anything, it is really of a piece. And I think they lead in to that throughout their career. You're still there, obviously.

But I was with you in New York for a lot of the blog house era, like starting in the mid-2000s, like Justice, Simeon Mobile Disco, like LCD sound system playing Daft Punk is playing at my house at Madison Square Garden. Like, what did that whole era do to Daft Punk's reputation? Like, in my memory, Daft Punk were turned into like, gods almost, like weirdly and maybe even like uncomfortably. Like, how do you look back on that now?

I mean, to me, it was just really cool. You know, imagine like the first artist you bought in a genre on Kasingel, you know, 15 years later. Yes. Was like, took over the world and like everyone thought they were the coolest band. Like, I felt great. You know, I'm a genius. Yeah. Yeah, you know, I felt like valid.

Not to say people didn't love around the world, like, when it came out, but... You knew. You totally know. Yeah. And even, like, with Pitchfork, you know, pitchfork famously gave discovery a bad review. And, you know, I remember being in college before I worked there and just thinking, like, oh, what a, what a miss. Right? They're going to regret this. I will make... I will personally see to it that this is corrected. Exactly. So yeah, that was cool to see. And yeah, the show is amazing and everything around it.

It felt validating, but also it was just a viscerally remarkable moment to experience as a concert. I still one of my favorite concerts I've ever been to. That's cool to hear you say because everyone just says like, oh, that's a famous moment in concert history. the pyramid and that like set the stage for like EDM and everything. And I wonder if that's like sort of calcified into a cliche. And for someone who was actually there to be like, no, it was actually that awesome. I still remember it. You know, it's, it's, it doesn't just represent something. Like, it was actually one of the best shows I ever saw. Like that's, that's rad to hear, honestly. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, just to circle back on the LCD thing, I was, I was, I was there.

I was there. And I remember it was, you know, it was a, you know, it was a perfect, weather, and I do remember this one person ahead of me at the show who was raising their crutch. Like, I guess they, you know, they twisted their ankle or something and, you know, entered the show with crutches. And in the middle of the show, it was, it was that powerful that they were healed. They were healed by these robots in a pyramid on stage. But yeah, I'll never forget. I'll never forget seeing that, seeing the silhouette of the crutch.

Yeah, it was great. That's beautiful. You're one of the few people, really, who've interviewed Def Punk, like for Pitchfork, like you said, like out of their helmets, you know, for random access memories. Like, were they weird the way a lot of people would maybe expect them to be weird?

Or is one of those things where it's weird, how normal they actually are, you know, when you don't have the helmets, you know? I think it probably, bore the latter. Yeah, yeah. Because the situation was funny because it was in the Coachella Valley. It was around Coachella.

They weren't playing Coachella, but they were there. I think Phoenix was playing and they're friends with them or whatever. And they were saying it being Crosby's estate in this like gated community. So just the situation was, you know, novel, you know, beautiful. like, you know, I'm not, I'm not lounging poolside, like, on the, on the hill. Yeah, exactly. So, so, yeah, it was just funny that they were, like, in their bathing suits, um, a pool side. Uh, so that was just kind of jarring because, like, you're saying, it's like, you just don't see them really, like, without the helmets. But once we actually got to talking,

you know, like, Tomas is really engaged. Uh, gimme and well is kind of more of the, quiet guy, more of the quiet one of the two. And Tomas is like the conceptual brain. And he was incredibly engaged and yeah, just so theoretical, really had an answer for everything in a way that you love to hear as a music journalist. He'd clearly thought about all the things I was asking about many times as far as, you know, their place as robots, how does being a robot

fit into the world of celebrity in the 21st century? What does that do? So yeah, I wouldn't say he was like especially weird. He just kind of talked a lot. And with authority. Yeah, yeah.

Nothing to crazy happened aside from just the setting itself. Right. Just everything, nothing crazy happened, but just everything was collectively crazy. You talk in that article about Daft Punk's earlier shows, like four homework in 1997, when they just let just stand there, right?

And like that wasn't like the joke, but like that was their deal. You know, as a listener and as a critic, like, how did electronic music as a live experience evolve to your mind from, you know, homework to the pyramid, you know, that 10-year block of time? It's interesting because we talk about, this is talked about in the article. in my article as well, but just this idea of one of the main concepts behind electronic music is that

the DJ isn't the star, like, you're the star. Right, right? The dancer is the star, right? And that, like, stardom, that fame is kind of reflected, right? Back at you. That's the ideal. And it's this weird,

it's a complex thing with the pyramid, especially because they are the star. You know, like, they're clearly the star. There's a lot of wattage going into that show. You know, like, everyone's looking at them. But what they were saying was basically, like, the helmets, almost like literally was, you know, as a reflection. Like, you can't see the actual person. That's, like, their version of that electronic music ideal of the audience being the star.

Because, and it's almost like have your cake and eat it too kind of thing for them. they're famous. Like, the robots are famous. Almost, you know, so many people know what that is and like what they look like. But at the same time, no one, not a lot of people know what they actually look like. They could walk right past you. Yeah, exactly. And I remember Tomas compared their situation at one point in the interview to him being like

a Mickey Mouse at Disneyland. There you go. Yeah, like, which I thought was weirdly apt. So, yeah, I think that, you know, probably early on, they probably just didn't really know what they were doing. And, you know, there's like everyone else just DJs, so that's what we should do. But then obviously over the course of that next decade,

their ambitions grew. And yeah, they figured out this weird in-between where they could be a pop star, get the adulation of a pop star, but also be anonymous. It's pretty incredible. I get what you're saying. You personally remember the pyramid, but you remember the crutch, right?

Yeah, exactly. Somebody in the crowd is just as important to your memory of that show as, you know, the megawatt pyramid action. With around the world, like now that you're a critic, and you see the way that disco especially keeps coming around again.

So reliably, like nowadays, it's like Dua Lepa or Jesse Ware or somebody. Like, does around the world, world feel like any less revolutionary or special or does every decade sort of get the disco adjacent anthem it deserves? Yeah, it doesn't feel less special to me just because even for, I mean, no one's going to mistake around the world for like a Bruno Mars song, right? Let's hope not. Yeah, or you know, or even do a leap or whatever. And if you just go back to the video, I feel like the video does a really great job of showing why this is so unique.

Like, no one's, you know, I love Jesse Ware, but I can't imagine she's going to make a video with like synchronized swimmers, you know, like in a, like dancing in a circle. That would be cool. But so, yeah, I think a lot of it is, is about the framing that makes that a unique moment, even if the style of disco or, you know, the references, the influences, the influences do come around. I feel like around the world especially really shows, you know, how they put their own spin on it. And I don't think anyone's quite done it the same way since. What I love about that video is that it sort of shows you physically how this music works.

You know, for anybody who was like electronic music isn't real music. It's not like real people. Like it's the way that it was literalizing everything that's happening in the song. Like I just love that I always think of the dudes running down the stairs to the baseline, right? Right? It puts a picture in your head that I do think you subconsciously apply to all dance music going forward. Like it just feels a little more real and human to you going forward if it hits you right. Yeah, and I think that makes sense. Did you, so you were in college when this song came out? I was, yes. I remember like playing defunct, you know, on college radio like between, you know, like third eye blind, you know, and built a spill or whatever.

And it was the dissonance of that was very pleasing to me. But like, I didn't have a lot of context for any of this either. But it sounded cool and different to me. And that was enough when I was 19. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think with the video as well, like with Michelle Gondry's style, it is, it is like this, it is a DIY aesthetic, you know?

And I think that's part of why it clashed so much and stood out, like, against a lot of that, that airs videos. It's the same thing we were saying. You know, like, that album, homework probably didn't cost a million dollars, and I'm sure that video cost a bit, but not like, you know, it's not Michael Jackson or something.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I feel like at that point in time, like, the music industry was, was at its, like, peak of, of profit. Right, yeah, and, you know, and, you know, and people were,

were breaking records of, like, the most expensive video. You know, like, it's funny to think about. That's such a 90s idea as like, that's the, that's the accolade. Or like, that's the benchmark. It's like, oh, this is the most expensive video. It must be one of the best, right?

So, yeah. So for this, for this relatively low budget thing to be on MTV and really kind of gain traction, I think that felt special too. You know, as someone, you know,

who is learning about their taste and trying to have taste that was a little bit more unique, that was the best that I could do at the time. And you nailed it.

You absolutely nailed it. You predicted the future with that Kisengel. How many Kisingles did you? This is 1996, 97. That's pretty late in the Kisingle life cycle,

I would have to imagine. Yeah, maybe that was one of the later ones. I was going to ask if that was literally the last Kisingle ever manufactured. Yeah, maybe it also might have

had to do it. I think I had a walkman. I think I was using a cassette Walkman longer than most folks. Also cool. Also very cool. Because at the time, I think CD Walkman, they did skip a lot. No, it's not conducive to walking or moving

for that matter. Yeah. Yeah, and that really bothered me. Of course. So the Walkman was kind of better in that sense. This has been awesome, Ryan. It's been so great to talk to you. Great to see you again. Thank you so much. Yeah, absolutely.

Thanks for having me. Thanks very much to our guest this week, Ryan Dombel. Thanks, as always to our producers, Jonathan Kerma and Justin Sales. Thanks to Chloe Clark for additional production help. And thanks very much to you for listening. I have a book coming out on November 14th. called songs that explained the 90s, you should check that out.

I would be delighted if you did. And now, without further ado, you should go listen to Around the World by Deaf Punk. And also music sounds better with you. Those two songs. Thanks a lot. We'll see you next week.