Kraftwerk - 1 Autobahn (1974)

A highlight of 2014: Kraftwerk play their entire catalog in the Vienna Burgtheater during the Wiener Festwochen. After having been successful at the Internet auction in the middle of a working day, expectations are high - and easily matched, if not surpassed.

Buddies: Schnee-Weißchen, David, Michael
Score: 5 out of 5
Merch: 'Autobahn' T-Shirt + mouse pad
Another gig: yes, if it's in a comparably innovative venue :-)

 
It's raining cats and dogs, so we are all happy to spend this evening in the holy halls of Burgtheater. David and me are very lucky to get some of the last pairs of 3D glasses - some failed. Without them, the entire thing would have been half the fun. When I am offered earbuds at the entry, I smile - but I would prove quite wrong in this respect, and I'll come back to this a bit later. First faux-pas: I am not aware that the first row of 'Parterre' is quite in the rear section of the ... well ... Parterre, whatever, I finally find my seat in time.

'Autobahn' has been a quite pragmatic choice because the other days did not fit that well. First surprise is the sound, which is very gutsy and with decent surround elements. 'Autobahn' sounds have been updated, but are still very retro. Sometimes the floor heavily resonates with the quite significant volume of the music, much stronger and compelling than expected at this place. And it's still authentic, the dreamy and spherical sounds you know from the original recording, but with today's strength. A very nice way to transform this music into 2014. Same is true for the 3D visuals, this is no hyper-realistic texture-excess, but very retro 3D polygons. I did not expect anything more exiting, the 3D effects were just nice.

Second surprise was that the song 'Autobahn' was a rather short version of the 22 min original - I expected more because the entire work is rather short. But this is of no disadvantage, after these five songs, a potpourri of all important Kraftwerk songs followed. Basically nothing is missing. It gives you a lively impression of the tremendous ingenuity and influence that this music had on the development of electronic music. From this perspective, a performance of this music in a very classical venue actually makes sense. In Kraftwerk's domain, their music is classical and can be performed in the Burg, without any need to play it unplugged or otherwise strangely.

As David puts it afterwards, this gig was impeccable. From myself, Kraftwerk gets highest credit for delivering a strong, yet very authentic performance at a classic venue.

Here are some short impressions of this impressive performance: