Personal anecdote time. A few months back, I was meeting with Ralf Hütter, who you may know best as one of the founding members of pioneering electronic group Kraftwerk. Me, I know him from a mutual hobby that Ralf has insisted his involvement with stay private. Anyway, we had met in a cafe in Vienna to discuss, well, I really can’t say what we discussed. Halfway through the meal, though, Ralf’s face opened up, revealing a bed of circuits and wiring.
“Hey Ralf,” I ventured. “If you don’t mind me asking, are you some sort of robot?”
“Robot?” he responded. “Eric, that is crazy. You are being crazy. Are you saying that your face does not suddenly detach once-to-twice a day, revealing the circuitry that makes you the man you are? Of the two of us, I think it is you who is the strange one.”
“Huh.”
I can’t prove it, but I am fairly sure the members of Kraftwerk are robots. At the very least, they’re some sort of man machine. Just look at these tour dates, as reported by Pitchfork. For men in their 60s, that’s quite a lot of touring. And some of these dates have both early and late shows? No man could perform so much music in one night. But a man machine, one built to perform the music we mere humans are not capable of recreating, could. Oh, how that man machine could play.
Kraftwerk dates:
01.21-23.14 - Stockholm, Sweden - Cirkus
03.13-15.14 - Mexico City, Mexico - El Plaza Condesa
03.18-21.14 - Los Angeles, CA - Walt Disney Concert Hall
03.23-25.14 - Oakland, CA - Fox Theater
03.27.14 - Chicago, IL -Riviera Theatre
03.29.14 - Toronto, ON - Sony Centre
03.30.14 - Montreal, QC - Metropolis
04.24-25.14 - Asheville, NC - Moogfest
05.18.14 - Vienna, Austria - Festwochen
07.10.14 - Tremčín, Slovakia - Pohoda Festival
07.18-20.14 - Salacgriva, Latvia - Positivus Festival
08.02.14 - Rattvik, Sweden - Dalhalla
• Kraftwerk: http://www.kraftwerk.com
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