Giorgio Moroder – ‘Déjà Vu’

After 30 years, the synth legend returns with an album studded with disco jewels. Déjà Vu boasts an impressive selection of pop’s reigning queens: Sia, Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue, Kelis, Foxes and Charli XCX. (Other artists also feature but their tracks are much less interesting and we’re on a word limit.) Moroder, a 75-year old Italian producer, is often hailed as one the most influential disco and electronic musicians of all time, working extensively with Donna Summer on such hits as ‘I Feel Love’, inspiring everyone from Daft Punk and Calvin Harris to Queen and The Human League.

‘Déjà Vu’ is deservedly the title track of this album. The summery song, themed around the feeling of starting to fall for someone, is composed in such a way that we rise and fall and tumble and soar along with Sia’s trademark vocals. You don’t know exactly what Sia is saying half the time (nothing new there) but it doesn’t matter, because it’s so refreshing to hear her ethereal tones in such an upbeat disco ensemble. Bravo, Giorgio.

The spoken “DIAMONDS” hook really needs to be available to download as a text message tone

The next track, ‘Diamonds’, is a grower – probably because it has Charli XCX written all over it. A listener should therefore forgive how most of the lyrics don’t make sense and play a lot on light imagery, because the chorus is effortlessly catchy and the spoken “DIAMONDS” hook really needs to be available to download as a text message tone.

While the track ‘Right Here, Right Now’ (featuring Kylie) might seem like a cover of Fatboy Slim’s electro banger of the same name, Moroder’s track is actually a funk-powered throwback to Minogue’s heyday, particularly in the kaleidoscopic visuals of the song’s video. Perhaps we were expecting something similar to the high camp of her 2000 anthem ‘Your Disco Needs You’, but given that this was the first single to be released from the album, ‘Right Here, Right Now’ has a chorus that is never quite as powerful as it could (and should) have been. The operatics on the track are, however, nonetheless amazing.

The same can be said of the Foxes track, ‘Wildstar’. We already know Foxes’ voice glides perfectly over electro beats (take ‘Clarity’, her song with DJ Zedd) and apparently the same applies for disco. Although not majorly iconic within the context of this album, it remains an enjoyable, disco drenched listen.

Moroder’s age hasn’t prevented him from modernising or competing with younger generations

Elsewhere, Moroder has three ‘solo’ tracks. On one, a pulsating rhythm that builds towards a heady crescendo is driven solely by a vocoder-distorted chant of the song title, serving as a motto for the entire album: “74 is the new 24”. If you say something enough it’s true, and Moroder’s age hasn’t prevented him from modernising or competing with younger generations. In fact, his adeptness at creating a simple yet effective dance track, crafted through decades of synth-twiddling, is showcased no better than here.

For example, ‘Tom’s Diner’ doesn’t even really have a chorus, but Moroder expertly transforms the vocal hook into this song’s main event. Suzanne Vega’s dreamy 1987 hit is polished to a sparkle here with none other than Britney Spears taking the reins. Her voice is so heavily vocoded on this track that you are sucked in by its soothing artificiality, and so it actually becomes even more brilliantly Britney™ because of it. That is to say, she embodies all the sonic qualities of a malfunctioning printer, left in an American wasteland, just trying to get a coffee.

We were so happy to see that Kelis was also on this album. We would go as far as to argue that the punchy chorus breaks through space and time: the ‘Milkshake’ singer shimmies into Donna Summer territory with those breathy, powerful vocals. APPROVED.

It cannot be denied that Moroder is a genius when it comes to creating a catchy synth hook

Aside from the album’s more impressive tracks however, it isn’t hard to see why, for some, Moroder’s comeback record is less than the sum of its parts. The album’s unevenness, particularly in songs like’ La Disco’ and ‘4 U With Love’, draw attention to the need for strong female vocals, against whom the generic tracks featuring lesser known male artists (Mikky Ekko and Matthew Koma) inevitably pale in comparison. Nonetheless, it cannot be denied that Moroder is a genius when it comes to creating a catchy synth hook. Déjà Vu seems a fitting title for an album in which we see an older, legendary producer quite openly and happily continuing to do what he does best.