Air – Moon Safari

Each month we take a look at a classic track or album and discuss it from a music production perspective, examining the stories behind its creation. This month we dig into the recording process behind Air's Moon Safari.

Released in 1998, the album catapulted the duo to immediate success and went on to sell more than 2 million copies. Moon Safari was particularly popular in the UK, where in the wake of Britpop, audiences were looking for something new and instantly latched onto its fresh sound. 

The key factors in the creation of the Moon Safari sound were the unusual combination of acoustic and vintage electronic instrumentation, along with the musicianship of Air's Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoît Dunckel. At the time the album was released, it was assumed by many to contain large numbers of samples; Air were based in Paris and the city was becoming known for its new wave of electronic acts spearheaded by Daft Punk. In an interview with Stereogum, Dunckel outlines just how wrong this assumption was; 'I saw a site where they tried to pick out all of the samples in the songs, and they actually picked out some samples that they thought were on the record, which is totally wrong. There are no samples; it's all played live. So it's true that people didn't really know what we were, but we are musicians. We were really playing, and we were playing with other people, too; other musicians.'

This collaborative aspect of the record is also important; key contributions include vocals from Beth Hirsch, strings recorded at Abbey Road with David Whitaker and tuba and acoustic guitar added by Patrick Woodcock. The duo were comfortable augmenting their sound with contributions from others and it all adds to the rich, layered palette of the record.

The vintage synths that appeared on the album were there partly through necessity – they were relatively cheap to buy in France at that time. However, Air also had a love for the sound that those old synthesizers produced and worked hard to gather the equipment together. In an interview with Reverb, Godin describes his methods: 'Once a month, I would buy Keyboard Magazine the first day that it hit the stands, and I would check out the 'for sale' ads. After leaving the bookstore, I'd head straight to the phone booth to snatch up gear before anyone else could.'

The result of all this was a record that sounded quite unlike any other at the time, and it was not long before it became ubiquitous; influencing a raft of new artists in its wake.