Kraftwerk Radio-Activity ( 180g yellow vinyl LP )

Release date 29-06-2012 (originally released in 1975)

2012 EU re-issue 180g Translucent Yellow vinyl LP - A concept album exploring themes of broadcast communications Radio Activity marked Kraftwerk's return to more obtuse territory extensively utilizing static oscillators and even Cagelike moments of silence to approximate the sense of radio transmission a pivotal record in the groups continuing development the title track the first they ever recorded in English is their most fully realized electropop effort to date while The Voice of Energy precipitates the robot voice so crucial to their subsequent work, sealed in picture sleeve.

Tracks
A1     Geiger Counter
A2     Radioactivity     6:42
A3     Radioland     5:52
A4     Airwaves     4:40
A5     Intermission
A6     News

B1     The Voice Of Energy
B2     Antenna
B3     Radio Stars
B4     Uranium
B5     Transistor
B6     Ohm Sweet Ohm

Kraftwerk built upon the international success of Autobahn by expanding their conceptual conceits to an albumlength exploration of radio waves and the bands other favorite wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum Musically the album represents a quantum leap of pop sensibility though still distinctly a prog soundscape its brilliant melodic hooks best represented by the title track and Airwaves are organized in more traditionalread shorterform In tracks such as the minimalist audioverite News Kraftwerk pay homage to another of their musical influences the great modern composer/theorist Karlheinz Stockhausen Antenna foreshadows the technogods they became with its electronic washes and clever lessistoomuch lyrics which read in total Im the antenna catching vibrations youre the transmitter give information RadioActivity is an underrated masterpiece waiting to be rediscovered Jerry McCulley