Karl Bartos on his days in Kraftwerk, the secrets and techniques of Kling Klang and Cliff Richard’s hitherto undisclosed affect on New York electro. Within the newest subject of Uncut journal – in UK outlets now and available for purchase from our on-line retailer, he tells Sam Richards extra.
For a musician synonymous with the interface between music and know-how, Karl Bartos’ Hamburg dwelling studio is surprisingly spartan. “I’ve a piano, a Martin D-28 guitar and a pc,” he reveals. “The core of my outdated tools just like the MiniMoog and the Arp synthesiser continues to be there, however they appear to retire now. Normally I am going out and file one thing within the streets.”
Reasonably than creating his personal sounds, Bartos is at the moment involved with paying deeper consideration to those who exist already round us. “Atmosphere is actually nice. I’ve discovered lots from John Cage about that – he mentioned, the good symphony is if you happen to go to a crossroads and take heed to the rhythm of the vehicles. Round right here, you hear ships on a regular basis. However mainly something makes a symphony. It’s actually an incredible number of noises on this world.”
Bartos was at all times a flexible musician. In his memoir The Sound Of The Machine, not too long ago translated into English, he describes hot-footing it between Kraftwerk’s Kling Kling studio and the orchestra pit on the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, whereas additionally enjoying drums in a rock’n’roll band and vibraphone in a jazz quartet. The vary of influences that powered minimalist masterpieces like The Man-Machine and Pc World was broader than you suppose. “I at all times take heed to music as a complete,” says Bartos, settling right down to reply your questions. “It’s all of the sound of being human.”
Are you able to describe your emotions the primary time you entered Kling Klang studio and performed the digital drums?
– John Densmore, Sunderland
The environment was like what you may examine Andy Warhol’s Manufacturing unit. It was this huge number of ineffective issues and helpful issues. In a single nook of the room I noticed a neon lamp, and so I had this sense of an artwork place, not likely a musical studio. The primary time I went there, we performed at a low stage. I had these knitting needles in my hand and the sound of them hitting the metallic pad was very loud within the room. You possibly can’t actually use your approach, in case you have a knitting needle! So I get alongside, and it was OK. However the subsequent time we performed full quantity, and that makes a distinction as a result of then out of the blue the sounds had been a lot louder than a standard drum set. The articulation was very low, you had only one growth! However over time, we developed a mode of modulating it via machines, technical results, and so forth. It was an attention-grabbing problem, and it opened my ears to issues I knew already. Sly & The Household Stone, they had been utilizing a drum machine however I didn’t discover a lot as a result of it was deep within the music. What occurred with Kraftwerk was the aestheticisation of know-how. Just like the Eiffel Tower – there’s no facade, it’s simply this pure skeleton.
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