Throughout the 1990s, disc jockey Roger Sanchez had been brought to a worldwide audience via his career as a remixer, but he wasn't satisfied. Like many DJs, he wanted to be an artist. And he wanted to be the best and if remixing had taught him one thing, it was how to make records." Sanchez conceived the idea of making an album when he found himself producing enough of his own material. He said of making First Contact: "I think for me what happened was that rather than initially saying 'Oh, I want to do an album', it got to the point that after years of just doing one off singles and remixes, I started producing a couple of my own tracks and I just felt I had a bit of a story to tell with my life."Although Sanchez had released several DJ mix albums and compilation albums in the 1990s and 2000s, including his then-recent Ministry of Sound mix Sessions Eleven: The R-Senal Sessions (2000), First Contact was the DJ's first studio album.
Sanchez said he wanted to create a "very personal" album that gave listeners "a little bit of background about where I'm from and where my mind is at, plus some of my own experiences so people could relate to it and vibe with it." Upon its completion in 2001, the album had drastically changed from its previous form a year and a half earlier: "I just thinned it out, focused it and concentrated it more. I'm very happy with the outcome." The DJ felt the final album "reflects and expands on the sounds that have shaped his life."
Sanchez constructed the album's tracks "like a house." He explained: "Everything has a foundation and the track is a construction. The skeleton frames, the beams are the bassline, and you build it up around that. I often start with the drums, although recently I've started to subvert that, to challenge myself more, and start with, say, a melody. I treat every track as a problem that I have to solve." Production of the song "Another Chance" was initially an issue as Sanchez felt it needed vocals, so he sampled the 1982 song "I Won't Hold You Back" by rock band Toto after he found the Toto IV album lying in the studio. Despite never taking 'blatant' samples, he made an exception for the Toto track as "lyrically it just made the track and hit something I'd gone through." Tom Ewing of Freaky Trigger described the production of "Another Chance" as Sanchez "hearing something in the winsome intro of an old Toto hit, cutting it loose, and then letting this tiny scrap of song spin through seven minutes of house music."
The album composition described by Sanchez as "a reflection of my life", is a lush and soulful house and disco house album, mixing smooth garage styles into a harder sound influenced by "fresh new beats" emerging from the United Kingdom and Europe. The album explored different styles and influences, including garage, electro and Latin music. A brief skit opens the album, in which Sanchez is heard logging on to his computer, which invites him "to select a track". This was followed by "Computabank", influenced by 1980s electronica acts like Depeche Mode and Kraftwerk, and incorporating styles of electro and industrial music. Julie C of Resident Advisor said the song gives listeners a taste of the style of electronica music "now filtering through their air waves" that had been adopted by Daft Punk. The emotional second track "Another Chance" featured two hooks, namely the repeating vocal, sampled from Toto's "I Won't Hold You Back", and the double drum-hit "that kicks the track up a notch each time it comes."
"Contact" was a deep house track fusing throbbing bass sounds and flanged sampling work. The disco-styled diva house song "You Can't Change Me" was a collaboration with Armand van Helden and vocalist N'Dea Davenport. The lyrics were based on an argument Sanchez had with his ex-girlfriend: "She became my manager and it broke up pretty badly. My career, my music comes first, and I travel all over the world. This is how it is, so if you walk into my life you have to expect it. "The Partee" was a big beat and house track driven by a brassy Latin music groove that highlights Sanchez's Dominican roots. "Ventura" is a 'formless' track based upon a chunky groove, followed by the disco-styled "I Never Knew", which features strings and "lite-funk" vocals from the group Cooly's Hot Box. "Nothing 2 Prove" is a laid-back song featuring vocals from Sharleen Spiteri of the group Texas. The genesis for the song came after Sanchez remixed Texas' hit "In Our Lifetime". Angela Johnson sings on the "electro soul" closing song "Leavin'".
