Date: Sat, 27 Jun 1998 07:07:24 -0400
From: Jan Svenungsson <JanSvenungsson@compuserve.com>
Subject: (kw) The creative process

 

I was at Roskilde. I was excited to see them again (I saw the Stockholm
concert in 1991). First it was magic when it all began, then it got real
bad when 30 000 people tried to crush me against the front, then when I had
escaped this fear and taken up a position a little bit back I could start noticing details and think about comparing with the ZKM recording, and
Fritz's sliders, and what exactly is Florian doing except looking bored,
etc etc. There was a moment when I was close to be bored myself. But then gradually I started to be sucked into this very special, very precise, very
unique combination of sound and images, futurism and nostalgia,
machine-presence and human presence, recorded singing and real singing,
technical perfection and technical glitches, music as message and music
with a message - being mesmerized by a very special and unique performance of music and art.

I enjoy the list-mix between members doing their best to take everything
apart and critize, as well as those who only wish to worship. I can't think of another music-artist or subject that could inspire the same mix. I think this is a very special sign of validity for the work of Kraftwerk. The power of inactivity.

I mean: why did jbv follow them around the world?

Regards

Jan Svenungsson

One more thing...

This might sound banal, but:

- - the way the audience go wild/the way I feel myself/ when the curtain rise
again and reveal an empty stage save for the machines that play what is now
obviously pre-programmed/recorded - this is a truly magical moment!
And if you want to see it as a piece of conceptual performance with all
kinds of highly advanced theoretical connotations - you're welcome (I might myself) - but you don't have to in order to "get" it.

And this, I believe, is an important distinction between the work of
Kraftwerk and that of certain "serious" electronic composers whose names
are frequently mentioned in the list's discussions.

 

Date: Sat, 27 Jun 1998 12:32:33 -0400
From: Jan Svenungsson <JanSvenungsson@compuserve.com>
Subject: (kw) coreography

More Roskilde.

On stage Ralf is serious and concentrated. He clearly cares about his work,
his playing (if any), his singing, the overall impression. When the
bouncers save people from being crushed you can spot concern in his eyes, but well hidden under the cool facade. He has a special way of standing
behind his keyboard which signifies attack, somehow (but kraftwerk language
uses only small characters, as is well known). He taps his feet sometimes

The youngsters Henning & Fritz are busy. If they are busy actually
interfering with the music, or just busy being busy is less important
(although Henning clearly plays the Radioactivity melody). They sometimes turn their back to the audience, between songs, fooling around with the
Kling-Klang consoles. When facing the audience Fritz is constantly moving his sliders, with both hands, and tapping his feet (just like Ralf). Fritz
looks cute, even smiles. Henning is not cute, looks worried.

(Henning is name-checked on Electric Cafe. Guess why Fernando made it into the performing group before him...)

Florian, finally. Florian looks like a For the main part of the set he's
standing behind a machine touching it randomly and thinking about an
interesting problem regarding the relationship between an obscure German
verb and a Samoan noun that one of his doctorate students brought up
yesterday. Then for the encore he suddenly finds himself with a toy in his
hand standing with no shield in front of a sea of screaming people. It
suddenly dawns on him where he is, and what's going on. Rock'n roll! ROCK'N ROLL!!! And so he rocks, like no-one has ever done before...

Except... - that is - that this coreography apparently is repeated each time they play.

And that this coreographyplays a very important part in the perception of Kraftwerk's work as a whole.

There is not one photo, except perhaps one with long hair, where Florian
does not look 20 years older than the others, trying hard to decide whether
to accept these juvenile circumstances or just leave.

Jan

Date: Tue, 30 Jun 1998 10:24:11 +0100
From: johan.andersson@allers.aller.se
Subject: (kw) I met Ralf@Roskilde

On wednesday 980624 in the green tent on Roskilde I met Ralf Hütter
(Im a Journalist, therefore I was there one day before the opening).
Its a short story: They had just rigged KlingKlang studio on the stage when
me and my wife came in and I saw this little man in front of the stage - It
was Ralf, so I approched him, took up my old Casio pocketcalculator (I took
it with me just in case) and asked him:
"Herr H=FCtter, would you like to sign my Taschenrechner", he took it in his
hand, looked at it and said "Das ist gut" and signed it.
You can all watch it at:
http://members.tripod.com/~KlingKlang/signedpc.html
Then I told him I was a member of the mailinglist and that we all wonder when
the new album is coming, then he just smiled and said: "Tomorrow, tomorrow"
So He did not confirm anything as sombody said earlier referring to my
meeting with Ralf.
Then me and my wife sat down drinking red wine, listening to the soundcheck
all evening IT WAS GREAT!!!! The soundcheck was continuing on thursday - two
days of soundchecking...
There was another listmember recording the soundcheck on a minidisc, maby he
could put it on the net somewere Please!

Review of the Very good concert later, got to do some work Bye!
/Johan

 

 

Date: Wed, 01 Jul 1998 23:55:17 +0100
From: RHC <rene@CyberCity.dk>
Subject: (kw) KW notes from Roskilde

I just have to say here what a fantastic recording the Numbers track from
Tribal Gathering is! You can find it at
http://www.ameritech.net/users/jtalbert/activek.html
Especially since it was the opening track at Roskilde and boy was i floored
by it.

My position in the tent was right in front of the soundtower. Right behind
me was the impressive soundboard where KW's "nerdy" looking soundman was
situated. During the 119.5 minute show he looked as if it was strictly a
routine matter. I remember when "Musique Non Stop" started to loop and
eventually fade, he rose from his chair, took his papernotes and made a
gesture to the regular soundman that it was set to slowly fade over a fixed
period of time. I also noticed some tall darkhaired chick dancing in the
closed area of the soundtower.

They had two more screens at Roskilde, a total of 6. The two extra ones
were situated on each side of the huge PA speakers and was at least twice
the size of the other four. Massive visual impact.

My ex-gf worked as a producer backstage so here's some trivia from Roskilde:

1) Two weeks before KW were to play at Roskilde all the meetings the ppl
working backstage on the Green stage had were about KW. They brought their
own sound and light man which is highly unusual at Roskilde.
They needed a dressing room right next to the stage to change to the
"grid-suits" during the show.

2) After the show the whole KW crew expressed that they were extremely
happy about the place and facilities.

3) Usually the band get's a case of beers after the show but the fab four
wanted red wine. They enjoyed it backstage and took off immediately after.

4) eMpTyVee Europe decided 20 minuttes before KW were to perform that they
wanted to record the song "The Robots". They litterally begged the KW
manager and the production crew backstag to get the permission. So
paperwork had to be done FAST! They got a hold of a cameraman who was at
Roskilde recording for a Danish music tv-show and got the permission to
tape it. They are allowed to show it on MTV during the next 12 months. So
everyone keep an eye out. Maybe even mailbomb the shitheads at MTV,
claiming a time and date so that we get a chance to see it.

- -Rene

ICQ UIN 2193840
A Staff Member of Last Sigh Magazine For Underground Music

 

 

From: johan.andersson@allers.aller.se
Subject: (kw) RoskildeSoundcheck-long report.

Some listmembers has asked me for a longer report on the soundcheck on
Roskilde so here it is:, When we first arrived I felt like going into a
religious temple, the huge big empty green tent with the Klingklang studio as an altar up front.
It was right after this I met Ralf, but that story I've already told.
The Wednesday soundcheck seemed mostly as a computercheck actually, they
where syncronising the videoscreens, so that the pictures where all of the
same size and color, playing mostly the programmed parts of the songs to
check the midi files? (Florian wasn't there all wednesday, he was expected to
arrive on thursday the guy with the mini-disc told me). As not so much was
going on for a while we took a walk, when we came back heading for the tent
(a bit exited, hearing numbers being played) we where stopped by guards
outside the tent - they didn't let any people exept their own staff in, the
guard told me "sorry but they will be really pissed of if I let you in.
But we stayed outside the tent anyway and I ran out on the campig to buy some
red wine.
They played Airwaves with the new ending, and my wife who heard it for the
first time liked it a lot and I can tell you the smattering sounds bouncing
in the big empty tent was a chill...
During the soundcheck the video screens wasn't synced with the music, so you
could for example see the graphics of manmachine being shown during
computerworld and sometimes they rewinded the graphics really fast, like a
videotape, but you could see it was not, it was a clean rewind - from
computer, you could also see checkboxes from the computer on the screens
sometimes (couldn't see what OS it was though).
On thursday I wanted to go there again even though my wife said: "they did
their soundcheck yesterday - they can't be that freaky" - but the were, this
day there where no guards, so you could step right into the tent - they where
playing manmachine and Florian had joined them on stage.
Shortly after we arrived a lot of people was running into the tent, the sound
was pretty loud today, you could hear it all the way to the orange scene.
Kraftwerk didn't seem fond of this so they pulled the curtains, no more
visuals Grrrrrrr.
I'm not so good at german so I really can't tell you what they said during
the check, but when the curtains was pulled Ralf said "Good night" - very funny...
There was a lot of joking going on, on the model for example Ralf sang really
exaggerated as in a musical and in german (it was in english on the concert)
I once heard someone on stage calling for Wolfgang, but I think it was just
the name of someone in the crew.
I can also tell you that they do play a lot of the melodies live, they were
jamming pretty much so you could tell what was programmed and what was not.
I heard from another listmember that they did perform a couple of completely
new songs during the soundcheck but I must have missed it, I was a bit late
on thursday.
Well thats about it, if you have any questions feel free to contact me.

/Johan