Kraftwerk: The Catalogue (Der Katalog)
I number among my friends a handful, perhaps more, of electronic music enthusiasts. Haloed around them are acquaintances who take their pleasure in different areas of the post-rave electronic dance diaspora (from jungle to dubstep, minimal techno to house etc.) and who regard themselves as reasonably knowledgeable about their respective scenes. Quite a few people in both camps are surprisingly unaware of the progenitors of the music they love. Please note I’m not claiming that Kraftwerk are the sole begetters of the myriad genres and sub-genres that make up dance music today: the sampling of Trans-Europe Express on Afrika Bambaata’s Planet Rock doesn’t mean they invented hiphop – a daft claim I’ve encountered on more than one occasion. However, their techniques, musical approach and subject matter certainly justify their position as the fathers of a majority of electronic and post-rave dance music.
Kraftwerk’s world tours between 2002 and 2006 and the Minimum Maximum DVD and CD live documentation have been an exercise in raising brand awareness and a chance to reaffirm the importance of their role. The activity also perhaps represents a rediscovered love of their own music and a desire to refresh and refine their oeuvre, as they did in 1991 with The Mix. Whether it also proves to be their swan song cannot be known, however I believe it’s likely to be the case in light of the thematic closure (ecologically supportable and efficient reconciliation between man and machine) that Tour De France represents. Ultimately though, the activity of the last few years is surely the essaying of a summation of a life’s work for the judgement of posterity.
Der Katalog, the long-mooted and long delayed, digitally-remastered box collection of the group’s key releases is surely the final stage of this process. That it represents a dotting of the full stop at the (possible) end of a long career may also be one reason why it has now been delayed for so long. Other reasons are probably the group’s famed perfectionism and also a pragmatic scheduling of relatively similar releases at an interval that will reduce consumer exhaustion to a minimum. Unsurprisingly, the three albums (Kraftwerk I, II and Ralf and Florian) that predated Autobahn are missing from Der Katalog. Their inclusion would have disrupted the otherwise striking consistency of the group’s approach over the last 30 years, a key, though relatively minor factor in their wider historical significance. In light of Kraftwerk’s remarkable, and welcome, self-control in not releasing extraneous product, even the smallest details acquire greater significance than would be the case for other artists. Thus, Der Katalog sees the renaming of Electric Café to the more sweeping (and originally titled) Techno Pop and the improved iconography of album visuals: the group portrait of Trans-Europe Express, replaced by a train symbol, the radioactivity warning symbol replacing the original radio set on the cover of Radioactivity. This is in contrast to the characteristic, but still surprisingly poor availability of the group’s back catalogue. For many years it was difficult to purchase Computer World (viewed by many as seminal) on CD. The inlay card on my copy of The Man Machine is a collage selling albums by other artists, common practice on inner sleeves in the days of vinyl, but rarely seen on CD:
Such details are characteristic for a group that has occasionally, and endearingly, failed to live up to its own image of machinic self-discipline and corporate presentation: many commentators make the common mistake of assuming that Kraftwerk have hymned the machine to the exclusion of feeling, but the central theme of their oeuvre, and what continues to ensure their relevancy, is their examination of the impact of technology on humanity itself.
If you’re tempted to purchase a copy of Der Katalog on eBay, prices tend to be in the region of £150 to £300 and copies are rarely available.
Further reading:
Minimum Maximum (CD review)
Minimum Maximum (DVD review)
July 2005 concert review
July 2004 concert review
Kraftwerk, an overview
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- Published:
- 05.05.07 / 9am
- Category:
- music
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