What you are about to read is posted by courtesy of Gina [thank you very much]: In the back pages of tenth anniversary issue of MOJO magazine, there is this piece which I assume is a regular feature about ex-members of famous bands: HELLO, GOODBYE Originally a classical percussionist, he later became a robot worker in one of the most influential groups of all time. This month... 80. Karl Bartos and Kraftwerk HELLO SPRING 1977 I was 22, and studying music in the Conservatorium in Dusseldorf, and my professor got a call saying that Kraftwerk needed a classically-trained drummer. I knew them because they had an underground reputation for doing strange and arty stuff, so I went with my vibraphone to the Kling Klang studio. It was all white with rough stone walls, a couple of synthesizers, some neon lights, a Farfisa organ and electronic drum heads, built by hand. So I played some pop music, and I was hired. I was used to playing Stockhausen, and was into pop music too, so it was a perfect mixture of both worlds. Ralf and Florian were like artists, strange artists. Usually you have white paper and black notes but they had black paper and white notes. It was fantastic! They also had UV lights and kept turning up the paper to shine the UV light on it. It was so intense, really psychedelic. I dug it very much. Later on they had whisky colas and I had an ordinary cola. Shortly after we had a gig in Cologne at a radio station. The next gig was Paris and the next was New York, Broadway! I ended up in a 10-month tour of America. And then I was back at the opera. Ralf would pick me up in his grey Volkswagen when the opera ended and we'd work into the small hours. My goal had been to become a professor, but I ended up playing electronic music for 15 years. GOODBYE AUGUST 1991 Our productivity decreased so much during the '80s. When we did /Electric Cafe/, we spent three months producing it in Times Square, a nice place to be but in the end every day was alike. We were working, yes, but how much work can you do when you're meeting at 8 o'clock at night and then watching old television programmes and trying to think about a new concept? Then we spent five years working on this mix record [1991's /The Mix/]. To me, this was distorting the past. They had a rigid attitude not to change things, and I felt annoyed that everything was going down the hill and shit. You can buy and sell machinery, but if you lose people's minds and loyalty then you're fucked. But it wasn't like being in Marshmellow Overcoat or something - Kraftwerk were /the/ German band. So it took me two years, maybe longer, to come up with this decision. In August 1991, I gave them the key to the studio and said, I can't do it any more. I think they were surprised. I went home in my car and talked to my girlfriend and, for the first time, thought about a career. Really sad. It takes me by surprise to see they have a new record out called /Tour De France/ - I wrote this track 20 years ago. My new album, /Communication/, is out at the same time; when people compare these records, I think the music will do the job. Interview by Ian Harrison Also in MOJO magazine this month is "THE MOJO HALL OF FAME" #50. KRAFTWERK World changing moment: Kraftwerk play Autobahn on BBC TV's Tomorrow's World, September 25, 1975. IT WAS a strange sight - three men playing electronic pianos, while a fourth hit metal plates with what appeared to be knitting needles. And yet, out of these contraptions came a melody. weird, but beautiful. Kraftwerk were not the first artists to use synthesizers - they had been colouring chart hits for at least five years, but the Dusseldorf alchemists were the first to create a joyful meeting of pre-war nostalgia with ultra-futurism. Autobahn celebrated German engineering, while inventing the `80s. Bowie was impressed. Future members of Cabaret Voltaire and The Human League saved up for synthesizers. And later, DJs in Detroit would rediscover their robotic charm. http://www.mojo4music.com/html/mojo_new_issue.shtml http://www.mojo4music.com/ http://www.mojomag.com/ http://www.mojomagazine.co.uk/ DER AUTOMAT