Best Kraftwerk Album

Not worthy in what way?

Just b/c it sounds a bit twee and childish. "Turn the dial with your hand..." doesn't have that same tone of tweeness.

Anyone cares to stand up for Electric Café/Technopop? Always felt that one was unjustly dismissed. "Telefone Call" is all time in my book.

Never liked it much until I heard that live version of "Musique Non Stop" on Minimum-Maximum which quite frankly rules. I just think that style of music was really outdated/unhip at some point in time, relistening to it now it's a pretty neat album, even if for once they sound slightly behind the curve.

Yeah experiencing "Musique Non Stop" live during the Min/Max tour was quite a revelation.

Like the album apart from "Sex Object", which I think has some sort of sampled slap bass on it, ugh. First side is great, haters begone.

Also CW is the album where Karl Bartos really comes into his own as a tunesmith, most of the melodies on that album are his.

Citation?

Citation?

David Buckley's Kraftwerk Publikation goes into this.

Interesting. I have Publikation but haven't read it yet.

Don't know if someone said this already but there's a new kraftwerk doc just starting on bbc4 right now

In the uk obv

Too much Paul Morley so far.

Digging all the footage of German kids losing their minds.

Repeated at 01:30 for you TiVo just.

Don't bother. Only half-watching etc. so

Morley: "The Beatles influence stuff like Elton John unlike our Kraftwerk guys"

Some other idiot: "They will be our Bach"

20 mins there is footage of Coldplay.

Bin.

My partner was watching it next door could hear Tago-Mago Damo through the open door, also heard the fucking Morlester:( so didn't investigate.

That was a useless programme dear the bbc

Not enough recent 'werk concert footage to be a docu focused on their recent live shows. Not enough interview footage with non-fuckwits (the only Holger Czukay was stuff seemingly filmed for something else, and they only got to speak to Derrick May for to like 10 mins in a warehouse?) to be a decent retrospective docu.

Also no Wolfgang or Karl, and the only archive interview footage is of Ralf.

Worth it for the old live performances of Pocket Calculator and The Robots

And Coldplay can do one

haha i came on ilm specifically to see what yers thought of this doc, i had a feeling it'd be judged to be lousy. weird though; the recent BBC Abba and Kate docs were great IMO.

No they weren't - its the usual 'isn't pop great' dreck filled with talking heads who would've hated the stuff at the time it was released.

Burn these museums.

Can't wait for UK Garage Britannia tho'.

the way it started with the tate gallery person listing a few random high profile artist pals who might be partial to a bit of the old kraftwerk and/or wanted to blag tickets off her was just ugh

mark s' review of the Tate show.

http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/2013/02/kraftwerk-tate-modern-turbine-hall-13-2-2013/

But yeah Nick these ppl disgust me.

Derrick May was beautiful, most of the rest of it was the usual supertrite cobblers, just stick up all the concert footage you've got and stfu imo

http://youtu.be/JHhBfx0ILkY?t=38m17s

this performance is fantastic too, hadn't seen it before and was worth ignoring the blathering heads for

lol yeah - blew the whole they are robots and don't interact.

I mean its mostly true but that was great. thx for posting it.

fucking Coldplay barely even deserve a mention in an hour long Kraftwerk documentary, let alone 2 minutes

Argh, now it's jumped back to them again! What the fuck

ah dammit, had been looking forward to watching the entire German documentary NV posted when I had an hour to spare, but it has been mercilessly yanked from youtube already

:(

it was just a dub of the one shown on BBC4 i think, don't know if there were different talking heads

ohh ok

I would hope there would be less Coldplay in the German version but probably no such luck

i only looked for that "rocking out" bit, don't know if there was a German Paul Morley or what

Klaus Mehrlig or something

That documentary would be quite a good intro for people who know nothing about Kraftwerk tbf

Also I just got Electric Cafe and it sucks :(

OK it's not a complete disaster but compared to their other albums it isn't very good at all

stick with it

I've been sticking with it since 1986 and it still sucks.

Too bad for you. IMO it's the album that benefited the most from the remastering job. "Boing" and "Musique" are pretty massive on the new edition.

a few weeks ago i succumbed to the urge and tracked down a copy of each remastered edition.
and yeah, EC/TP does sound really good now.
that said, i have the original vinyl, and have always had a soft spot for this album.
goes nicely alongside the other digital/sample/vocal cut up album of the era - zoolook by jean-michel jarre

those remasters are excellent. glad someone brought up Zoolook - IMO it's a better album but between that and Electric Cafe, I really wish there was more of this stuff. that kind of surreal digital sampling was pretty cool!

excellent balcony-cam footage for gear trainspotters

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b16s210t0pk#t=698

It changes all the time, but right now my favourite is Trans Europa Express.

I could make a case for any of them except Kraftwerk 2 and *shudders* Electric Cafe. (I'm ignoring the general existence of The Mix.)

My favourite Kraftwerk album is typically "whichever Kraftwerk album I am listening to right now".

I mean, in terms of "most typical" if I'm trying to turn a new person onto Kraftwerk (I've got our Punk Receptionist at work into Can, but she's balking at Kraftwerk so far) I'll tell them to start with Man Machine. But favourite? I don't know!

At the moment I'm really into the transitional period, Ralf und Florian -> Autobahn -> Radioactivity specifically because it's so unformalised and the gel hasn't quite set yet. I could watch the video for antenna all day long. (I sometimes wonder if I love them or just their iconography, but I'm a sucker for oscilloscopes.)

I have loved that double album debut, I got it in 1975 (long story), and Autobahn too (that was earlier), I know R&F and Radioa quite well..

I got the big box a few years ago for a daft price thanks to a mistake by Amazon but I've not unshrinkwrapped it yet as the albums are all on Spotify, ..

I think the best way of approaching it is to bite the bullet and play them in reverse chron order. What I have heard of Electric Cafe is that its not so bad, the I guess its because I remember the girls singing along to boom-chakk back in the day.

Did anyone else want the KraftNeu or the Kohoutek single?

I first heard the majority of Kraftwerk through 'The Mix', so sometimes those original versions can sound a bit flat and lo-fi to me, even if the Mix's versions are pretty terrible. My problem with Kraftwerk, iconic and important that they were, is that sometimes their tracks go on just a tad too long. Like, for me listening to Autobahn can feel a bit like something I have to subject myself to out of self-improvement; like reading Moby Dick or something. It's not that I don't enjoy it, but it can feel like a bit of a slog after just a few minutes.

The only one I can't say that about is Radioactivity which is such a great understated record. Computer World works well too, as a pop album.