So I finally got around to playing Human After All (still haven’t dared approach the huge ILM thread!) and, well, it’s alright. What lets them down is their workrate – if this had been a side project, Daft Punk Explores The Wonders Of The Talkbox, nobody would feel betrayed. Or if they put out an album once or twice a year and HAA was seen as an experiment, I think it would be quite well received. As a long-awaited follow-up to a landmark record – um.
For what little it’s worth I think the blockiness and ugliness are surely intentional, effective when they work (“Steam Machine”, “The Brainwasher”, even “Robot Rock”), awful when they don’t (the last three tracks). To enjoy it even a tiny bit you need to like the tone of crudely treated voices and keyboards at least slightly as much as Daft Punk obviously do. Dancing to most of it is clearly impractical but a ‘dance-punk’ band could do worse than covering the title track.
And that’s all, really.