Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter has described writing the score for Tron: Legacy as a “depressing” and “limiting” experience, according to NME. He discussed the 2010 Disney film on a recent episode of The A24 Podcast with Dev Hynes, also known as Blood Orange.
Bangalter said director Joseph Kosinski originally wanted Daft Punk to make a fully electronic soundtrack. But he and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo hoped to take advantage of the project to work with a full symphony orchestra instead.
He explained that the process became difficult once the music was tested against the film. According to Bangalter, many sounds in the middle frequency range clashed with the dialogue, which made the score hard to shape the way they wanted.
Bangalter said that while he had spent months developing synth tones, film scoring often required stepping back so the performance would not get in the way of the picture. He added that it was frustrating to have many ideas and then have to return to a more traditional approach when some of them did not work.
Tron: Legacy was Daft Punk’s first full film score, and Bangalter previously called it the most challenging and complex project the duo had taken on. Daft Punk split in 2021 after 28 years, and Bangalter said earlier this year that a reunion was not in the cards because there were still other things to explore outside the group.
