Disco Symphony

About

Disco Symphony appears on the second disc of XXV as one of the album’s standout new tracks. Written by Robbie Williams, Guy Chambers and comedian Jimmy Carr, it originated years earlier and was first adapted for the 2019 stage musical The Boy in the Dress. The version recorded for XXV brings the song fully into Williams’s world, combining camp disco, orchestral grandeur and self-aware humour.

Produced by Chambers and arranged by Steve Sidwell, the track opens with a dramatic orchestral fanfare before launching into a full pop groove, recalling 1970s dancefloor euphoria. Layers of strings, brass and rhythm section create a glittering wall of sound, while Williams delivers a knowingly flamboyant vocal performance that nods to the genre’s excesses with affection. The lyric, filled with double entendres and wry self-references, finds him embracing both silliness and sophistication: “Another floor filler from your tortured singer.”

Originally intended as a duet with Kylie Minogue, the song was recorded solo after Minogue’s own Disco album commitments prevented her participation. Williams has called it “daft, whimsical and poppy,” qualities he fully inhabits in this exuberant production. Its fusion of orchestral instrumentation and dance rhythms places it among his most playful recordings in years.

“It’s so daft and whimsical and silly and poppy. I love all those things. There’s a part of me that never wants to sing it for the rest of my life, but I love it.”Robbie Williams

Joyful, self-mocking and irresistibly theatrical, Disco Symphony reaffirms Williams’s flair for showmanship. Its mix of irony and sincerity captures the spirit of XXV, an album that celebrates his past while proving he still knows how to fill a dancefloor.