OT: Kraftwerk Koncert Review

[J.D.McEachin]

This isn't DIY, but I'm sure most people on this list have found
Kraftwerk to be a major inspiration, so here it is.  Besides, they
did use some custom built equipment. :)

The air was electric as the curtains parted at the Warfield Theater 
Sunday night, marking the first US concert by Kraftwerk in 17 years.
The stage had 4 workstations arranged in a shallow V pointed at the
audience, with 2 men on either side.  Florian was on the right end, 
with a shaved head now.  Ralf a headset mic on the left.  The 2
other members, whose names I forget, were in the middle.  All wore 
thin leather jumpsuits with high necks.

It was easy to see under & behind the workstations, where there was a 
long arc of equipment consoles stretching across the stage.  At the top 
of these consoles were bright white lights, at the bottom a rainbow strip 
of flourescent or cold cathode lamps.  Behind the equipment racks were 4 
large video screens.

A buddy tried to identify equipment - he spotted four Kawai K-5000 synths, 
a Raveolution, and a DA-88, but there was a lot more. We couldn't couldn't 
see what sort of control surface was on the workstations; most of the 
motions I saw looked like slider pushing & pulling, with some button 
punching and a little key playing.  

The show started with Numbers, large numbers flashing on the video
screens,  I spent this track getting used to the sound, the venue, and the
realization that I was seeing & hearing Kraftwerk live.  Next up was Home
Computer, which was fairly true to the original, though the bass & drums
were kickin'.  Then came The Man Machine, which  mixed English & German
lyrics, which were shown in monochrome on the videos.   Tour De France was
the song I most wanted to hear, and I wasn't disappointed.  This was a
pretty straight version of the achingly beautiful original.  Black & white
footage of an old tour de france was shown.  Next I heard car sounds, and
I knew it was Autobahn, which was a faithful, albeit shortened version.
Vintage cars were shown, along with pictures of the Autobahn, and their
new Autobahn logo.  Then came The Model, another old style version (though
when I say  this, I mean that the drum programming hadn't been modernized
to sound like The Mix, even if the drum sounds were beefier).  Vintage
black & white footage of fashion models was shown.  Next came a radically
reworked version of Airwaves off of "Radioactivity".  This was a fantastic
update of a song which I always felt could be better.  Now it is.  Great
job guys!   Radioactivity was next, with updated lyrics to include
Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and other nuclear disasters.  It sounded
more like the version off The Mix.  Finally came Trance Europe Express,
still a juggernaut.  Yes, vintage trains filled the screens.  With that,
the curtains closed,

*************  SPOILER *************

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The curtains opened to the lads, erm, old men standing in front of their
consoles holding remotes.  Yes!  It was Pocket Calculator.  Unfortunately
Florian had some problems with his, but he was a real trooper and made funny
gestures with it, swinging it around like Roger Daltrey wiith a mic,  to
the delight of the crowd, until one of the others got it working again.
Then he jammed on it, to the further delite of the crowd.  Then the
curtains closed, and there was again much applause.  Then the curtains
opened again on a black light set, with everyone wearing suits with dayglo
yellow stripes and wraparound dayglo shades.  They launched into a ravey
number which was new.  I found this to be a little disappointing, because
even though it featured some nice tweaky modular sounding synth work,
overall it sounded like Kraftwerk following rather than leading. All my
musician friends were  convinced that they let their hair down and
improvised a bit on this track.  The curtains closed again, to much
applause, then opened again, to the video screens lowering, which revealed
The Robots!  For me, this was the highlight.  The lighting was fantastic,
lots of strobes &  bottom lighting which made the robots seem to move more
than they actually did.  This version was much like The Mix version, and
it was excellent.  I wish the robots had stayed to perform more numbers.
Oddly enough, Florian's robot still had hair.

Finally, the video screens raised up to cover the robots,  the guys
returned to the stage,  and began Music Non-Stop.  Videos of the animated
graphics from Electric Cafe were shown, with the wireframes of the band
echoing the stripes on the band's suits.  I could tell they were having
more technical problems, because there were things shown in the video that
weren't echoed in the music.  One by one they left the stage, and I sensed
that this was the last song.

Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed this show, even if it was horribly retro for
me.  At least all the songs were updated in one form or another.  All the
black & white film footage just accentuated the retro feeling.  And Ralf &
Florian looked old - that was really weird.  At least Florian seemed to
loosen up & enjoy himself in a few places.  I just wish they'd get up the
nerve to release some truly new material - it's been way too long.

JDM