"傻朋克"不走尋常路 《走運》問世一年

ON SOME DAYS this summer, the robots would rise, get into their cars and pull onto Sunset Boulevard or Melrose Avenue-streets that, with their sun-sloshed vistas and waving palms, seem engineered for windows-down, volume-up music listening. Yet no matter what radio station they turned to, the robots were greeted by the same song, one they recognized right away. There was the supple, shoulder-lifting guitar lick; that sturdy, urging drumbeat; and the aerial chorus that functions as a brag, a mission statement or both: We're up all night to get lucky. And though Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo -the two French musicians better known as the robo-attired duo Daft Punk -usually make a point of never listening to their past creations, they'd always let the music play. Despite having lived with the song for more than a year, even they weren't sick of 'Get Lucky.'

今年夏天的某些日子裏，兩位“機器人”起牀，上車，開上日落大道(Sunset Boulevard)或梅爾羅斯大街(Melrose Avenue)。街道的兩旁，是沐浴着陽光的景色，和搖曳多姿的棕櫚樹，好像就是爲了要讓人們搖下車窗、調高音量聽歌。然而不管調到哪個電臺，兩位“機器人”聽到的都是同一首歌，他們馬上就能辨認出來的那首。有那輕快的、讓人不由得聳起肩膀的吉他過門，有那厚實的、急切的鼓點，還有那空靈的副歌──是一種炫耀，或者說是一句使命宣言，或兩者兼有：我們整夜不睡，爲了成爲彼此的幸運兒(We're up all night to get lucky)。托馬斯?本高特(Thomas Bangalter)和蓋-馬努爾?德霍曼-克里斯托(Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo)這兩位法國籍音樂家──即機器人打扮的二人組合“傻朋克”(Daft Punk)──通常特意不去聽他們過去的作品，但碰到這首歌的時候，他們總是讓它播放下去。《走運》(Get Lucky)已經問世一年有餘，然而他們自己也都沒覺得厭煩。

'It's an unexpected, simple, very cool surprise,' says de Homem-Christo. 'Seeing the next car is listening to it, and people are nodding. Or the other day, at a restaurant, seeing kids and mothers having a birthday party, and they're all dancing. I know it can be annoying, having it everywhere like that, but it seems to have spread.'

德霍曼-克里斯托說：“此曲是一場始料未及的、簡單的、非常出色的意外。看到旁邊車上的人在聽，在點頭，或者是另一天在某家餐廳，看到孩子們和母親們在開生日派對，大家都在起舞。我知道到處這樣可能很煩，但它好像已經傳開了。”

It's a midsummer afternoon, and Bangalter and de Homem-Christo are sitting in a control room at Conway Recording Studios in Los Angeles, the city that serves as their stateside headquarters. The space is dominated by a gargantuan console teeming with hundreds of buttons and knobs. It looks like the kind of device that, were you to flip the wrong switch, would accidentally launch a drone strike on Palm Springs.

那是一個仲夏的下午，在兩人的美國大本營洛杉磯，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托坐在洛杉磯康韋錄音室(Conway Recording Studios)的一個控制室裏。房間裏矗立着一臺佈滿了幾百個按鈕和旋鈕的巨大控制檯，那架勢好像一弄錯開關，就會不小心對棕櫚泉(Palm Springs)發起一場無人機打擊一樣。

A little over a year ago, the two men were working out of this room, overseeing the final mixes of not only 'Get Lucky'-a song so huge, it would sire endless remixes and remakes-but also much of Random Access Memories, their fourth studio album. Bangalter and de Homem-Christo describe their creative process as 'research and development,' and for Random, they worked without deadlines or budgetary constraints, with the hope of capturing the scope and sound of mammoth studio-crafted records from the '70s and early '80s-a time when cost was not a key consideration, and when a hit album had the same reach and life span of a hit movie.

一年多一點時間之前，兩個人就是在這個房間裏忙碌，監督《走運》以及他們第四張錄音室專輯《超時空記憶》(Random Access Memories)裏很大一部分作品的最後混音工作。《走運》成爲大熱門，衍生了很多重混和翻唱作品。本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托將其創作過程稱爲“研發”，對於《超時空記憶》，他們沒有限制時間也沒有限制預算，希望呈現出70年代末80年代初大錄音室專輯的那種廣度與音質。在那個年代，成本不是關鍵的考量因素，一張熱門專輯的走紅範圍和時間不亞於一部熱門電影。

As they were finishing up, Bangalter says, 'We had a very strong sense of happiness. It was like a weird fantasy: Let's make a record like it's the '70s. But we were very puzzled by the way it would clash with today's world.'

本高特說，收尾的時候“我們有一種強烈的幸福感。就像是一場奇異的幻想：讓我們像70年代那樣來錄一張專輯吧。但後來它與當今世界的碰撞方式讓我們感到非常不解”。

This is understandable, given that, on paper at least, the album would seem like a potential disaster-a record that found the duo turning away from the type of sound that's made Daft Punk one of the most memorable and unpredictable acts of the last 20 years. Ever since their 1997 debut, Homework, Daft Punk's been at the vanguard of electronic music, creating one sample-jacking, endorphin-morphing hit after another. And the group's ultrarare, mega-elaborate live shows helped set the standard for today's lucrative, spectacle-driven electronic-dance music festivals.

這種不解是可以理解的，因爲至少從表面上看，這張專輯似乎將要敗得一塌糊塗。讓傻朋克成爲過去20年最難忘、最變化莫測搭檔之一的那種聲音，在這張唱片裏已經消失不見。自從1997年發行第一張專輯《家庭作業》(Homework)以來，傻朋克一直走在電子音樂的前列，一首接一首地推出讓同行抄襲、讓聽衆或痛或喜的熱門歌曲。這個組合極其少見而又超級精妙的現場演出，又從一個方面爲今天利潤豐厚、以盛大場景爲追求的電子舞曲演出設定了標準。

On Random, though, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo moved toward live instrumentation and a big studio sound. And, after years of working largely on their own, they brought in a raft of collaborators that ranged from strikingly of-the-moment ( Pharrell Williams ) to blatantly anachronistic ( Paul Williams, the former Muppets collaborator and writer of such Nixon-era classics as the Carpenters' 'We've Only Just Begun').

但在《超時空記憶》裏面，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托轉向了現場器樂與大錄音室音質。在基本上獨自運作多年之後，他們請來了一系列的合作者，既有紅得發紫的如法瑞爾?威廉姆斯(Pharrell Williams)，又有完全過氣的如保羅?威廉姆斯(Paul Williams)。後者參與了《大青蛙布偶電影》(Muppets)的音樂創作，也是卡朋特樂隊(Carpenters)《我們纔剛剛開始》(We've Only Just Begun）等尼克松時代經典作品的詞作者。

The resulting album features not only the lushly produced disco of 'Get Lucky,' but also a career-recapping spoken-word history lesson from 73-year-old Italian producer Giorgio Moroder ; an eight-minute power-ballad featuring Paul Williams, a choir and a 65-person orchestra; and a handful of downer synth ballads that sound like they're being performed by a GPS device that's gone off its Wellbutrin. Sonically and culturally, Random resembles nothing else produced in 2013.

由此形成的專輯中不僅有《走運》這首華美的迪斯科，還有73歲的意大利製作人喬吉奧?莫羅德爾(Giorgio Moroder)概括其從藝生涯的一段口述史，一段有保羅?威廉姆斯參與的八分鐘動力民謠，一段搭配65人管弦樂團的合唱，以及一些沉鬱的合成民謠（像一臺安非他酮抗抑鬱藥吃完了的GPS導航儀在演奏一）。不管是從聲學角度來是從文化角度來看，它都不同於2013年的其他任何專輯。

Yet it's turned out to be the biggest album of the group's 20-year career, aided by a past-forward marketing campaign and, of course, the inescapable 'Get Lucky.' At a time when audiences for everything in the mass-culture continuum-from summer blockbusters to top 10 TV shows-have fractured and dwindled, 'Get Lucky' proves that, every once in a while, a song can transcend being merely an affable sing-along hit and become an omnipotent force across all ages and genders. It's like 'Hey Ya!' or 'Crazy in Love'-a song we'll pretty much be hearing until we die.

然而藉助於一輪貫通過去與未來的營銷，當然還有走到哪裏都能聽到的《走運》，《超時空記憶》成了傻朋克20年從藝生涯當中最火爆的專輯。在各種大衆文化類型──從暑期大片到前10大電視節目──的觀衆都已瓦解、萎縮之際，《走運》證明，每隔一段時間都能夠有那麼一首歌，超越膾炙人口的熱門歌的範疇，成爲一種跨越年齡、跨越性別的全能力量。它就像“Hey Ya!”、《瘋狂的愛》(Crazy in Love)一樣，是一首我們差不多會一直聽到老死的歌曲。

This was, in some ways, Daft Punk's hope all along. Ever since the early '90s, when they were teens in Paris, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo have rarely settled on living in one era at a time, instead interrogating the past, the present and the future all at once. 'When we first met,' says Bangalter, 'we were already listening to music that was 20, 30 years older, or watching movies that were 50 or 60 years older. I think that's what we tried to do with Random. The only objective was to create something that could have a certain kind of timelessness.'

從某種意義上講，這正是傻朋克一直以來的希望。自從90年代還是巴黎的毛頭小夥時，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托就很少一次停留在一個時代，而是同時拷問過去、現在與將來。本高特說：“第一次見面的時候，我們已經在聽二三十年前的歌，或者是看五六十年前的電影。我想這也是我們希望在《超時空記憶》裏面實現的。唯一的目標，是打造出某種可能擁有一定永恆性的東西。”

BECAUSE THEY'VE TAKEN great pains to obscure their identities over the last two decades-with goofy masks or elaborately opaque robot helmets-a somewhat tenuous mystique surrounds the duo. Earlier this year, a photo of the two men, taken during what appeared to have been a booze-pong party at Columbia Records headquarters, found its way onto Gawker and the Huffington Post. The incident appears to have only mildly irked Daft Punk, but not for the reasons you'd expect. 'We didn't play beer pong,' Bangalter says, laughing. 'I don't even know what beer pong is.'

怪怪的面具，精心設計成不透明的機器人頭盔──傻朋克在過去20年裏不遺餘力地掩蓋自己的身份，因此他們身上籠罩了一層淡淡的神祕感。今年早些時候，兩人的一張照片出現在新聞網站Gawker和《赫芬頓郵報》(Huffington Post)上，拍攝場合似乎是哥倫比亞唱片公司(Columbia Records)總部的一場“booze pong”（扔乒乓球喝酒遊戲，又稱beer pong）活動。這一事件好像只給傻朋克造成了一點小小的煩惱，但並不是因爲你所以爲的原因。本高特笑着說：“我們沒有玩beer pong，我都不知道beer pong是什麼東西。”

As anyone who saw that photo knows, the members of Daft Punk pretty much look like dudes who would listen to Daft Punk. Bangalter, 38, is tall and lean, with a light beard and an easy smile; on the day we meet, he's dressed in a gray H sker D T-shirt, light gray jeans and slip-on sneakers, his hair hidden beneath a blue-and-red Patagonia hat. De Homem-Christo, 39, has shoulder-length hair and heavier scruff and is wearing white sneakers, tight black pants, a dark T-shirt that says 'Bad Attitude' and a wishbone pendant around his neck. He has a reputation for barely talking in interviews, but after initially appearing to doze off on the sofa, he becomes nearly as talkative as his longtime friend and partner.

看過照片的人都知道，傻朋克成員的相貌跟傻朋克的普通聽衆沒有什麼兩樣。38歲的本高特又高又瘦，留着短茬絡腮鬍，帶着從容的笑意。我們見面的那一天，他穿着一件印有Husker Du樂隊圖案的灰色T恤、淺灰色牛仔褲和一腳蹬帆布鞋，頭髮則隱藏在一頂紅藍相間的Patagonia牌帽子下面。39歲的德霍曼-克里斯托長髮齊肩，頸背較厚，穿着白色運動鞋、黑色緊身褲、印有“Bad Attitude”（態度差）字樣的深色T恤，脖子上掛着一件Y型吊墜。很多人都知道他很少在接受採訪的時候說話，這次採訪開始的時候他好像還在沙發上打起了瞌睡，但過後他就差不多跟他的老友兼搭檔一樣地健談了。

The two first met in 1987, as eighth-grade art kids at Paris's Lyc e Carnot, where they were surrounded by aspiring bankers (both come from creative backgrounds: de Homem-Christo's parents ran an ad agency, while Bangalter's father was a successful songwriter). It didn't take long for them to find one another. '[The school] was a factory for making businessmen,' says Bangalter. 'Anybody who had a certain aspiration for something creative, whether it's movies or music or design, would stand out.' They struck up a conversation about film-The Lost Boys being the first of many movies they'd watch and discuss together. Later, they'd produce their own fanzine, Banane M canique (Clockwork Banana), the first issue of which featured a mash-up of the poster for A Clockwork Orange and the cover of the album The Velvet Underground & Nico.

兩人第一次相見，是1987年在巴黎Lycee Carnot學校，彼時他們都是八年級的藝術生。在這所學校，他們周圍都是渴望進入銀行業工作的同學，而兩人都來自從事創意行業的家庭：德霍曼-克里斯托的父母開了一家廣告公司，本高特的父親則是一位頗有建樹的詞曲作家。兩人不久便發現了彼此。本高特說：“（那所學校）像是一家制造商人的工廠，任何人只要懷揣從事某種創意行業的理想，不管是電影、音樂還是設計，都會引人注目。”他們開始談起電影，《捉鬼小精靈》(The Lost Boys)成爲他們一起觀看並討論的衆多影片中的第一部。後來他們出版了自己的同好雜誌《發條香蕉》(Banane Mecanique)，其中第一期是把電影《發條橙》(A Clockwork Orange)的海報和專輯《地下絲絨樂隊與妮可》(The Velvet Underground & Nico)的封面糅在了一起。

And though Bangalter and de Homem-Christo both obsessed over vintage acts such as the Doors and Jimi Hendrix -and would spend hours at the library, looking at microfiche of old rock magazines-it would take years for them to make music together. Their first song was a short loop of drum machine and bass, recorded at Bangalter's home. 'We were ripping off this bass line, thinking we were doing something extraordinary,' says de Homem-Christo now, smiling at the memory.

雖然本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托都癡迷於《大門》(The Doors)和《吉米?亨德里克斯》(Jimi Hendrix)這樣的經典影片，並且會在圖書館連坐數小時觀看舊搖滾雜誌的縮微膠片，但多年之後他們纔開始一起做音樂。第一首作品是鼓機與貝斯的循環短曲，是在本高特的家裏錄製的。憶起往昔，德霍曼-克里斯托臉上露出微笑，說：“我們是在壓榨這條貝斯聲線，覺得是在做一件非同尋常的事情。”

Later, they'd form a ramshackle guitar band, Darlin', before immersing themselves in the growing rave movement, regrouping as Daft Punk and releasing a series of singles, finally culminating in Homework, which was recorded in Bangalter's bedroom. It's a buoyant, grabby debut, anchored by the underwater thump of 'Around the World' and the prowling, glitchy bass of 'Da Funk.' The album was a critical hit, even in the states, and established Daft Punk as madcap dance-floor alchemists.

後來他們組建了一支鬆散的吉他樂隊，名叫“Darlin’”，然後又全身心投入到當時正在壯大的“rave”運動，重組爲“傻朋克”樂隊，發佈了一系列的單曲，最後有了《家庭作業》這樣的巔峯之作。他們這首張專輯在本高特的臥室裏錄製而成，風格輕快而撩人，以《周遊世界》(Around the World)的水下敲擊聲和“Da Funk”低沉而吵啞的貝斯聲壓陣。它是一張至關重要的熱門唱片，即便在美國也是如此，並且奠定了傻朋克舞曲界的狂妄煉金術士的地位。

It also earned them a reputation as reluctant semi-stars. When they'd play gigs, de Homem-Christo would hide behind equipment or turn his back, Miles Davis -style, to the audience. 'I was too shy to be confronted by any kind of audience,' he says. 'Going to the blackboard at school was the worst torture.' To promote Homework, they wore goofy animal masks, kept a safe distance from the press and didn't appear in videos, preferring surreal clips directed by the likes of Spike Jonze and Michel Gondry.

這張專輯還爲他們贏得了一種不願拋頭露面的名聲。要做現場表演的時候，德霍曼-克里斯托就會躲在樂器後面，或者是像邁爾斯?戴維斯(Miles Davis)那樣轉過身去背對觀衆。他說：“我太怕羞了，不管哪種觀衆都不敢直接面對。在學校上黑板是最痛苦的折磨。”爲了推銷《家庭作業》，他們戴上怪怪的動物面具，跟媒體保持着安全距離，並且不在視頻中亮相，也更喜歡斯派克?瓊斯(Spike Jonze)和米歇爾?岡瑞(Michel Gondry)等人導演的超現實鏡頭。

For 2001's Discovery, Daft Punk introduced a new look, in the form of impenetrably sleek robot getups. They also debuted a new sound: a mix of soft-rock haze, guitar-shredding rock and meticulously coordinated goofiness. The record yielded Daft Punk's then-longest-charting hit, 'One More Time,' a new millennium ode to unyielding good times that, considering how the rest of the decade turned out, now sounds equal parts ebullient and poignant.

爲錄製2001年的《發現》(Discovery)，傻朋克推出了一副新的裝扮：光滑?亮而又密不透風的機器人服裝。他們還推出了一種新的音質：慢搖滾的迷茫、撕裂吉他的震撼和精心設計的癡顛混合在一起。這張專輯有傻朋克當時在音樂排行榜上盤踞時間最長的歌曲《再一次》(One More Time)。它是對即將呈現的好時代的又一次千年讚頌。考慮到後來10年發生的情況，現在它聽起來既熱情奔放，又五味雜陳。

Daft Punk's music would continue to mutate over the coming years and albums, from the aggro Human After All (2005) to the swelling, orchestra-aided Tron: Legacy soundtrack (2010). With each new release, the robot masks would undergo some new iteration. For Bangalter and de Homem-Christo, the masks function as a way to ensure privacy: They like being able to go out without being harassed, and they strive to keep their personal lives as undocumented as possible (neither cares to discuss his family, though both have children, and Bangalter is married to French actress élodie Bouchez ).

在接下來的年頭和專輯裏面，從2005年激憤的《畢竟還是人類》(Human After All)到2010年激情澎湃、有管絃樂輔助的《創：戰記》(Tron: Legacy)配樂，傻朋克的音樂在繼續變異。每發一張新專輯，機器人面具都會有一些新的演變。在本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托看來，面具起到一種保護隱私的作用：他們喜歡出門的時候能夠不被人騷擾，而且都儘量保持私生活“無據可查”的狀態。（兩個人都不喜歡談論自己的家人，不過他們都有孩子，本高特的妻子是法國演員艾洛迪?布歇(Elodie Bouchez)。）

In later years, as the duo got more famous-their legendary 2006-2007 tour found them playing gargantuan arenas-the helmets let them avoid all the insincere glad-handling that comes with being recognized, especially in the music industry. 'You feel it's not real when people are, like, petting your back all the time,' says de Homem-Christo. But, perhaps most importantly, being cloaked in head-to-toe suits-the most striking iteration of which was designed, with glittery sleekness, by Saint Laurent's Hedi Slimane -and voice-altering electronics grants the members of Daft Punk the ability to disappear from even themselves. 'It allows you to forget what you've done and what you are,' says Bangalter. 'For us, the idea of always starting from scratch is really interesting.'

在之後的年頭裏，隨着傻朋克的名氣越來越高（2006年到2007年的傳奇巡演期間，他們已經在超大的演出場地演出），頭盔讓他們逃掉了被認出來之後不得不面對的各種虛情假意，特別是在音樂行業。德霍曼-克里斯托說：“比如說別人一直在撫摸你脊背的時候，你會感覺不真實。”但最重要的恐怕還在於，躲藏在從頭到腳的戲裝（最惹人眼球的版本是 羅蘭(Saint Laurent)的赫迪?蘇萊曼(Hedi Slimane)設計的一套閃閃發光的服裝）和改變音色的電子樂裏面，使得傻朋克的兩位成員隱遁於人前，甚至是隱遁於自己。本高特說：“它使你能夠忘掉自己做過什麼，忘掉自己是誰。在我們看來，總是從零開始這一點真的非常有趣。”

It's an ethos that goes all the way back to their early days, right after they came up with 'Da Funk.' The track was such a crowd-pleaser that Bangalter and de Homem-Christo set out to make a soundalike sequel. It would have been an easy hit, but the song was such an obvious unsatisfying self-homage, they decided not to release it. 'That was a big change of direction,' de Homem-Christo says. 'We said, 'Let's try something totally opposite,' and from that day, we never did the same thing.'

這種氣質發端於傻朋克的早期，即他們推出“Da Funk”之後。由於這首曲子非常迎合大衆口味，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托決定推出一首相似的續篇。如果面世的話，它將很容易走紅，但這首歌是一種明顯的自我崇拜，他們很不滿意，所以決定不予發佈。德霍曼-克里斯托說：“那是一次很大的轉向。我們說，‘來做點完全相反的事情吧’，從那天開始，我們從未做過同樣的事情。”

BANGALTER, QUICK AND SPRINGY, is leading me around the room at Conway, where they worked not only on Random, but also on several tracks for Kanye West's Yeezus album. He shows me a gorgeous Steinway piano in one corner, and a booth where they oversaw the Gary Glitter-gone-tribal drumbeats of West's hit 'Black Skinhead.' In their early years, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo preferred to do much of their work at home studios, but Random opened them up to 'stuff we couldn't really do at home,' says Bangalter, gesturing around a large recording area. 'We were like, Okay-clap-let's experiment.'

身形輕快敏捷的本高特帶着我參觀康韋錄音室的那個房間。在這裏，他們不僅錄製了《超時空記憶》，還爲坎耶?韋斯特(Kanye West)的專輯“Yeezus”錄製了多首曲子。他帶着我看了屋角一架漂亮的斯坦威(Steinway)鋼琴，還有一間隔音室──韋斯特熱門歌曲《黑色光頭》(Black Skinhead)裏面類似狂野版蓋瑞?格利特(Gary Glitter)的鼓聲，就是兩人在那間隔音室裏監製的。早年的本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托更喜歡使用家裏的錄音室，但本高特指着錄音室裏一片寬闊的錄音區說，《超時空記憶》讓他們看到了“無法在家裏完成的東西。我們就像是：OK，試驗一下吧”。

Random began in earnest in 2008, when Bangalter and de Homem-Christo moved their gear into a giant studio and began playing around. Inspiration came from Tron, which they were still in the midst of scoring, and which required them to work with a full orchestra. Though they'd collaborated with other musicians in the past-most notably on the 2007 West single 'Stronger'-as Tron progressed, they found themselves energized by the prospect of incubating a more open-ended creative community. They started to see their role on Random less as musicians and more as filmmakers, shepherding a large group of disparately talented people and uniting them behind a single vision.

《超時空記憶》的錄製工作在2008年正式開始。本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托把他們的裝備搬到一個大型錄音室，開始試音。靈感來自於《創：戰記》，當時他們還在爲這部電影配樂，而電影的配樂要求他們跟一個完整的管弦樂團合作。雖然過去也曾跟其他音樂家合作（特別是2007年錄製韋斯特單曲《更強》(Stronger)的時候），但隨着《創：戰記》配樂的進行，他們看到孵育一個更開放創意共同體的可能性，併爲之感到振奮。他們開始覺得，在《超時空記憶》裏面，他們的角色與其說是音樂家，倒不如說是導演：帶領一大羣各懷稟賦的人才，把他們團結在同一種想象之下。

So Bangalter and de Homem-Christo ditched their samplers and began a years-long series of recording sessions, traveling to Los Angeles, Paris and New York. As with any project they undertake, Bangalter says, making an album 'is so day-to-day. We don't have a road map or a master plan.'

於是本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托拋棄了採樣器，前往洛杉磯、巴黎和紐約一期一期地錄製，耗時數年。本高特說，跟他們做的任何項目一樣，錄製專輯是一種日常工作，“沒有路線圖也沒有總體規劃”。

Perhaps no track exemplifies their calculated capriciousness better than 'Get Lucky,' which took more than a year to record. Bangalter and de Homem-Christo had been working on the track since 2008, but the song's sparkling guitar lines weren't in place until they met with legendary guitarist and producer Nile Rodgers. At first, the three men just talked.

恐怕沒有哪首曲子比錄製耗時一年多的《走運》更能體現他們精心設計的反覆無常。本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托從2008年就開始創作這首歌，但直到他們遇上傳奇吉他手兼製作人奈爾?羅傑斯(Nile Rodgers)，這首歌閃耀的吉他聲線纔開始成形。起初三個人只是在口頭上談。

'Their discussions with me were holistic discussions,' notes Rodgers, who provided 'Get Lucky' with its spiky backbone riff. 'It was like, we're treating this record as if the Internet doesn't exist. And I interpreted that as, we're approaching this record the way we approached records in the pre-digital era. Which meant performances had to have a linear life: a beginning, a middle and an end. And those performances had to be played pretty damn good.'

爲《走運》貢獻了核心連復段的羅傑斯說“他們與我的討論是原則上的討論。我們對這張專輯的處理就像是互聯網根本不存在一樣。我的解釋是，我們要像對待前數字化時代的專輯一樣對待這張專輯，也就是演奏必須是一條線性的生命：有開始，有中間部分，有結尾，而這些演奏又必須做到一流。”

After some discussions about what the group was trying to achieve, Rodgers took out his guitar and started playing. The riff for 'Get Lucky,' Rodgers says, came 'right there on the spot. When I first started playing, it was a little too complicated. You could see this look on Guy-Man's face, which was not so approving but respectful, and I knew I wasn't in the right place yet. But that's how all my stuff starts out. I do complicated things first, simplify it, then work backwards.' Rodgers would wind up contributing to three songs on the album, including the most recent single, 'Lose Yourself to Dance.'

在討論要實現什麼樣的目標之後，羅傑斯拿出吉他開始彈奏。羅傑斯說，《走運》的連復段“完全是即興演奏的。我開始彈的時候還有點過於複雜，從蓋-馬努爾的臉上就可以看出，雖然不是很贊同，但還是充滿尊重，我就知道我還沒有做到位。但我的所有作品都是這樣開始的，先把複雜的做出來，然後予以簡化，倒着回去”。到最後，羅傑斯爲這張專輯裏面的三首歌曲出了力，其中之一是最晚出的單曲《迷失自己於舞蹈》(Lose Yourself to Dance)。

Months later, after shaping the track on their own, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo summoned Pharrell to their studio in Paris. Once again, they didn't start playing right away. Instead, they listened to a few singles Pharrell had been working on and talked music. 'They were feeling the same way I was,' Pharrell says. 'That everything now is so programmed, it's missing the human element.'

幾個月後，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托在自己定好《走運》大體框架之後把法瑞爾叫去了他們的巴黎錄音室。這一次他們也沒有馬上開始彈奏，而是聽了法瑞爾之前正在創作的幾首單曲，並談論音樂。法瑞爾說：“他們跟我的感覺一樣，就是現在什麼都通過編程編好了，缺失了人的元素。”

'They're very methodical, but at the same time very sensitive with how they make their music,' Pharrell continues. 'Not sensitive in a negative way, but very open. And their music is always in a constant pursuit of feeling. That's a recurring theme in every piece of music they make, and that's not a human trait to me; it's more characteristic of a robot.'

法瑞爾接着說：“他們非常地有條不紊，但同時對自己如何做音樂又非常地敏感。不是那種消極的敏感，是非常地開放。他們的音樂一直是在不斷地追尋感覺。這是他們每一件音樂作品裏反覆出現的一個主題，在我看來它並不是人的特點，勿寧說是機器人的特點。”

After giving the jet-lagged Pharrell a superstrong over-the-counter French stimulant, Bangalter and de Homem-Christo cued up a rough draft of 'Get Lucky' and asked if he was interested in working on it. 'For the most part, they let me roam free,' he says. 'They introduced it as a blank canvas: What are you hearing; what are you seeing? We did so many takes of different parts, because they like to capture something perfect. And perfect doesn't mean that every syllable is sung correctly. Perfect means it touches the soul.'

在給倒時差的法瑞爾吃了一劑超強的法式非處方興奮劑之後，本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托準備彈唱《走運》的一個草稿，問他有沒有興趣參與創作。法瑞爾說：“他們基本上是讓我自由發揮。他們把這首曲子當作一張空白畫布呈現給我：你聽到了什麼，你看到了什麼？我們對各個不同的環節做了多次嘗試，因爲他們喜歡捕捉到某種完美的東西。完美的意思並不是每一個音節都唱對，而是每一個音節都觸及靈魂。”

When it was all over, Pharrell got back on a plane. He was so exhausted, he could barely remember what he'd sung.

全部完事之後，法瑞爾坐飛機回去了。精疲力竭的他差點都想不起自己唱了什麼。

HERE ARE A FEW oft-spoken truisms about the music industry in the year 2013: Pop songs, even big ones, are lucky if they can dominate the airwaves for more than a few weeks; the major-label system is a slowly smoldering empire in decline; the best way to ensure a chart-topping, culture-conquering album is to shake the tendrils of some deep-pocketed mega-corp (Samsung, Bud Light) that has as much to with music as it does with, say, llama husbandry.

關於2013年的音樂行業，有幾句常常被說起的老生常談：流行歌曲（哪怕是熱門流行歌曲）在電臺上播放的時間如果能超過幾個星期，那就算運氣好了；大唱片公司制度是一個正在慢慢焚化的衰落帝國；確保一張專輯登頂排行榜、跨越文化界線的最佳辦法是擺脫一些實力雄厚的大財團的羈絆，比如三星(Samsung)、百威(Bud Light)等，這些大財團不僅做音樂，還做羊駝養殖之類的業務。

These are all, sadly enough, pretty much well-founded realities at this point. But the release of Random, and its ensuring success, has proved to be, at the very least, a temporary rebuke to the way music has been sold in the last decade.

可悲的是，這一切在當下基本上都是有根有據的現實。但事實證明，《超時空記憶》的發佈及之後取得的成功，再怎麼說也是對過去10年音樂發售方式的一種暫時的批判。

Bangalter and de Homem-Christo had funded the record's production, but instead of releasing it independently, they turned to Columbia Records, one of the oldest major labels in the world-and also one of the last. 'Before we'd heard the record, we met with them to talk about their philosophy,' says Columbia Chairman Rob Stringer. 'Their attitude was, records do still sell, if they have quality and imagination behind them. We talked about campaigns that were really based on the golden age of the record industry, in the '70s and '80s, when the Sunset Strip was as much about music as it was about movies.'

唱片的製作經費由本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托提供，但他們並沒有獨立發行，而是求助於世界上第一批成立、也是最後一批存在的大品牌之一：哥倫比亞唱片公司。哥倫比亞公司董事長羅伯?斯汀格(Rob Stringer)說：“聽這張唱片之前，我們跟他們見了面，談起他們的理念。他們的態度是，只要有足夠的質量和想象力，唱片還是可以好賣的。我們談起推廣計劃。這些計劃其實是基於唱片行業在70年代、80年代的黃金時期，那個時候日落大道不僅關乎音樂，同樣也關乎電影。”

Random was introduced using a mix of retro showmanship and new-media cunning. Instead of announcing the record online, the band teased it with a brief, vague ad on Saturday Night Live, a clip that featured little more than their helmeted visage and a quick snippet of 'Get Lucky.' That was followed by billboards in cities like New York and London; a series of YouTube interviews with the likes of Pharrell and Rodgers; and a reveal of the album's track-listing on the video-sharing app Vine.

《超時空記憶》的發佈將懷舊錶演技巧與新媒體技巧融合在了一起。傻朋克並沒有在網上發佈這張專輯，而是欲擒故縱地在《週六夜現場》(Saturday Night Live)發佈了一則簡短而含混的廣告，鏡頭上除了他們戴着頭盔的形象和一小段《走運》之外基本上就沒有別的了。之後專輯的廣告又打上了紐約、倫敦等城市的廣告牌，然後是YouTube上法瑞爾、羅傑斯等人接受採訪的視頻，以及視頻分享應用Vine上發佈的專輯歌曲列表。

The buildup to the record was so steadily intriguing that, as Random's release date came closer, its success felt like a fait accompli-which is strange, given that, for all their success, Daft Punk had never broken into the top 40 in the U.S. So when the album finally debuted at number 1, no one was surprised-in part because of its persuasive marketing, but also because, by that point, 'Get Lucky' was beginning to lodge itself in the country's collective hippocampus.

造勢活動穩步吊人胃口，所以當《超時空記憶》的發佈日期日益臨近的時候，它的成功感覺已經像板上釘釘。（這一點很不尋常，因爲傻朋克儘管很成功，但也從來沒有進入到美國銷量排行榜前40名。）所以當這張專輯最終實現上市首周便取得銷量第一的成績時，誰都不覺得奇怪，這既是因爲它的營銷說服力很強，也是因爲到那個時候《走運》已經開始融入美國人的集體記憶。

And though it never actually reached the top of the singles charts in America-denied entry by Robin Thicke's 'Blurred Lines,' also featuring Pharrell-it's hard to think of another song this year that proved as joyfully egalitarian, or as reliably escapist, as 'Get Lucky.' 'People are in a time or a place when they wanna feel again,' says Pharrell, when asked why the song took off. 'The Internet has brought on so much ubiquity. When you can get the news real-time, and with 7 billion people on the planet, odds are, there's gonna be bad news. I think we're all ready to hear music that takes us away and allows us to have a good time again. Most people just want to be happy.'

《走運》事實上從未登頂美國的單曲排行榜（被羅賓?西克(Robin Thicke)的《模糊線條》(Blurred Lines)擠出，這首歌也有法瑞爾參與），但很難想到今年有哪首歌像它一樣地充滿了快樂的平等主義和確切的逃跑主義。法瑞爾在回答這首歌爲什麼走紅的問題時說：“人們想再次感受曾經處過的時間或空間。互聯網帶來了如此多的無處不在現象。地球上有70億人口，當你隨時能夠讀到新聞，讀到的很可能就是壞消息。我覺得我們都樂意聽到一些帶我們遠走高飛、讓我們能夠再次享受好時光的音樂。大部分人不過是想感到快樂。”

There's another music-biz axiom that Daft Punk's flouted this year, much to the chagrin of its fans: Namely, that when you've got an album as big as this one, you've got to get out and play it live.

傻朋克今年還鄙視了另一條音樂行業的公理，讓其信奉者大爲懊喪。這條公理是：推出這樣盛大的一張專輯，你必須親自出馬搞現場演出。

The group's last tour-during which they performed in a massive light-up pyramid-ended in 2007. The shows have become legendary: Like Woodstock, they're the kind of gigs people remember fondly, even if they weren't actually there. Daft Punk never had a problem selling out huge venues, but the group's scarcity has only increased their fans' demand for more stage time.

傻朋克的最後一次巡演在2007年結束（期間他們曾在一個燈光璀璨的巨型金字塔裏表演）。那幾場演出已經成爲傳奇：像伍德斯托克音樂節(Woodstock)一樣，它們也屬於那種被人津津樂道的演出，儘管實際上並不是在伍德斯托克進行的。傻朋克的大型表演從來不愁賣，但這個組合很少演出這一點只會讓歌迷更加希望他們多在舞臺上演出。

As proof, witness the group's only live appearance this year, at the MTV Video Music Awards. They were originally supposed to appear on Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, but after what host Stephen Colbert later claimed was interference from MTV, the duo pulled out. (MTV, Colbert and Daft Punk all declined to comment.) As it turns out, the VMAs wound up being Daft Punk's only strategic misfire of the year-after all the buildup to their appearance, it was deflating to watch two guys in robot suits simply help hand out an envelope onstage.

作爲證據，不妨看看這個組合今年在MTV音樂電視大獎(MTV Video Music Awards)頒獎典禮上唯一的一次亮相。本來他們要在喜劇中心頻道(Comedy Central)的“科爾伯特報告”(The Colbert Report)中表演，但後來還是退出了，據主持人斯蒂芬?科爾伯特(Stephen Colbert)後來稱，這是因爲MTV方面的干預。（MTV、科爾伯特和傻朋克均拒絕置評。）事實證明，MTV音樂電視大獎頒獎典禮成爲傻朋克今年來唯一的一次失策：在有關他們將要亮相的各種造勢活動之後，看到兩個穿着機器人外套的人在舞臺上只是幫忙遞出一個信封，實在讓人泄氣。

As of now, the group has no plans to play live, even though the electronic-dance field they've inspired has grown into a multimillion-dollar industry, and despite the fact that there are no doubt millions of fans (and certainly a few business associates) who would love to see them hit the road.

儘管在傻朋克激發下誕生的電子舞曲已經成長爲一個龐大的產業，儘管肯定有數百萬的樂迷（肯定還有一些商業夥伴）期待看到他們走上巡演之路，但到目前爲止，這個組合還沒有現場演出的計劃。

'We're not sensitive to any kind of pressure, because the most valuable thing we have is our own freedom and creative dreams,' says Bangalter. 'There's less value for us in a big bag of money than in a creative idea we want to fulfill. The world we live in today is slightly off because money makes the world go. So we've had the freedom to always pick the thing that makes us the most happy.'

本高特說：“我們不在意任何壓力，因爲我們擁有的最寶貴的東西，是我們自己的自由和創作夢想。一大袋子錢對於我們的價值，比不上一個我們希望實現的創作構想。我們今天生活的世界有些偏離正軌，因爲金錢能讓地球轉動。總之我們有自由去挑選最讓我們感到快樂的東西。”

Still, it seems a given that at some point Bangalter and de Homem-Christo will decide to reimagine their live show, in the same way they rewired their sound. After all, a song like 'Get Lucky' only comes along once or twice a career, and as much as the robots love watching our reactions to it from the safety of their cars, it's hard to believe they won't want to see that joy amplified, illuminated and shared, and among thousands of faces all at once. After all, they're only human.

但本高特和德霍曼-克里斯托似乎肯定會在將來的某個時候重新想象他們的現場演出，就像他們重新設計自己的聲音一樣。畢竟像《走運》這樣的歌曲在藝人從業生涯中只會出現一兩次，而且，既然這兩個機器人喜歡舒舒服服地坐在車裏看我們對這首歌的反應，很難相信他們不想看到這種快樂被放大、被點亮、被分享，一瞬間呈現在數千張臉孔之上。他們畢竟還是人類。