Kraftwerk
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'SKALAR' explores how light and sound affect our emotions
Photons have no mass, but in an exhibition at the CTM electronic music festival in Berlin, artist Christopher Bauder treated light as a moldable, solid substance. The installation was married to a complex soundscape by musician and composer Kangding Ray, and set in the historic Kraftwerk Berlin industrial space. The result, SKALAR, was an epic light show that put spectators through an entire "wheel of emotions."
Kraftwerk takes techno pop into the third dimension
Not to be undone by bands that release artwork via fax machine or by albums released in sheet music form, German electronic mainstay Kraftwerk's next record will be available in a 3D format. It's a fairly unusual approach to making music as you can't really hear 3D (unless you experience synesthesia). This latest collection of tracks will be released on Blu-ray in autumn. Ralf Hutter, the only remaining original member, told Rolling Stone that it will consist of 3D performances with surround sound.
Kraftwerk's 3D concerts return to North America in September
Good news if you missed out on Kraftwerk's 3D concerts the last time the band was in North America: you're about to get a second chance. The electronic music pioneers have announced a slew of American and Canadian dates that will let you see their immersive visual landscapes first-hand. This stint kicks off in Edmonton on September 16th, and reaches the US with a September 19th gig in Portland; you'll also get to see these 3D performances in cities like Austin, Boston and Miami. The tickets are likely to sell out quickly when they go on sale May 8th, so you'll want to act quickly if you just have to witness a spectacle like "The Robots" in person. [Image credit: John MacDougall/AFP/Getty Images]
Would you put a gas-powered iPhone charger in your pocket?
Batteries are expensive, so it makes sense that device makers are in no hurry to cram in more capacity than is actually necessary. The downside of this, of course, is that if you're out and about, the responsibility of keeping your hardware fully charged is yours alone. Most people overcome this, either by attaching themselves to any available wall socket or keeping a rechargeable power pack in their bag. eZelleron, however, is hoping that people will want to carry a small gas-powered generator in their pockets instead.
Kraftwerk performing 3D-enhanced retrospective concerts over 8 nights at MoMA
New York City isn't Europe and eight straight nights isn't exactly endless (though, it's plenty long if you're talking about lamp oil), but this humble metropolis is good enough for electronic and Krautrock pioneers Kraftwerk. The robo-rockers are heading to MoMa on April 10th and will be playing eight albums in chronological order, starting with Autobahn, over eight nights. The performances will sadly only feature one member of the classic lineup, but it will be augmented with 3D video and other visual media (presumably including neon lights). Tickets for the concert series, Kraftwerk-Retrospective 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8, go on sale at noon on February 22nd for $25.[Image credit: Andréas Hagström, Wikipedia]
Book review: How To Wreck A Nice Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to Hip-Hop
How To Wreck A Nice Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to Hip-Hop by Dave Tompkins (Stop Smiling Books; $35) World War II increased the rate of human innovation to a pace unseen in any other period of history. New technology from the era includes everything from synthetic rubber to the atomic bomb to magnetic audio tape, which the Germans successfully kept secret until the war's end. After the Nazis fell, Lt. Jack Mullin of the US Army Signal Corps shot footage outside of Hitler's home, grabbed one of the Fuhrer's piano strings for a souvenir, and brought two AEG Magnetophons (along with fifty reels of Farben recording tape) back with him to the states. He then sold a recorder to Bing Crosby, revolutionizing broadcasting and music-making in the process. Another device that made its debut in World War II only to be later adopted by the entertainment industry is the Vocoder. Speech synthesis was the brainchild of a Bell Labs employee named Homer Dudley. Dudley surmised that human speech consisted of two things: the carrier (the noise that your vocal cords makes) and the formant (the sound formed from the carrier by your mouth, throat, and sinuses). Dudley went on to develop something called the Voder (Voice Operator DEmonstratoR), which used a carrier tone generated by a radio valve and a formant created by hissing air to create artificial speech. Hear a demonstration (and learn about how the Vocoder was used to defeat the Axis powers) after the break.
What's your favorite music to play to?
Don't get me wrong, I think some of the background music in many of the MMOs I've played is downright fantastic, full of sweeping moments, uplifting passages, and sections of near-earworm quality. However, everyone's taste is different; the same piece of music cannot appeal to every player equally well. And there are, regrettably, moments when what the game has for you to listen to just doesn't do justice to what you're feeling at the time.So, what do you put on instead? Do you prefer to have some Alice In Chains for those dungeon crawls? Indulge in Beethoven for battleground free-for-alls? A little Kraftwerk for ... for craftwork? Or do you just let whatever's in the queue play on? I'm curious; lemme hear it!
Early custom Kraftwerk vocoder on the auction block
You wax faux-nostalgic about the heyday of early robo-Kraut-rock, your early signed pressing of Radio-Activity is rivaled only by your original Neu! Super / Neuschnee 7-inch, and you got a belly laugh at that one scene about the record the nihilists once cut in The Big Lebowski. Kraftwerk fans, today is your lucky day. The original one-of-a-kind prototype vocoder Kraftwerk pictured on the rear cover art of and used to record "Ananas Symphonie" and "Kristallo" on their 1973 release Ralf & Florian. As of the time of this writing it's already up to five grand, so if you want yourself an extremely expensive piece of history for electronics and electronic music, you'd better get a move on, schnell.[Via Music Thing]
