Tag Archives: Kraftwerk

44. How 2B Confused

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Installment #44 of How 2B Confused aired back in February, 2023 (c/o CiTR.FM.101.9).

How 2B Confused has been airing for the past couple of years, but for various reasons has been getting ignored here at Randophonic.com. That is now changing. It’s our longest countdown yet, also our most random and least concise, tracking as it does the 1499 Records We All Really Need To Hear Before The Eschaton Immenatizes.

Whatever that means.

What it means is we’ll be at it until either the end of time, or we hit #1, whichever happens first (assuming both don’t happen in simultaneous singularity).

Download link (c/o CiTR.FM.101.9) Mixcloud stream.

A few highlights from How 2B Confused #44.

50. radio-activity

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“Call Kraftwerk’s Radio-Activity the theme song for maybe the best thing I’ve ever done with my time – radio, that is. The creative exploitation of those airwaves I’ve had access to – the chances taken and the activities pursued, all the while never trying to sell anybody anything except perhaps the notion that freedom is real … at least for an hour or four every now and then, late at night, after the normals have gone to bed and the bureaucratic restrictions have been mostly lifted. Not that Radioactivity’s only about that kind of radio. It also concerns the other kind, discovered by Madame Curie (I actually learned this from Kraftwerk). But the one, of course, informs the other, all those mysterious and invisible waves permeating our various spheres and personalities, touching our souls, beaming off into space, alerting who knows what alien entities of our existence … perhaps a hundred million light years from now, when they finally get the message. And the amusing thing would be if the first song they ever heard was title track of Kraftwerk’s 1975 masterpiece – the geniuses from Dusseldorf doing their damnedest to sound like machines, releasing great depths of humanity in the process.” (Philip Random)

(image source)

121. hero

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Neu! being German for New! Hero being the closest Neu! ever came to a proper song with lyrics and singing and everything. Meanwhile, at pretty much the same moment in time, somewhere across town, their former band mates Kraftwerk† were perfecting what would come to be known as techno-music. So maybe call Hero† a proto-form of punk. Beat simple and four-to-the-floor, everything else snarling melodically along until screaming to noise at the end. And the world would hear it one way or another, the times would change. And seriously, who better than some malcontent German hippies to call bullshit on the whole notion of heroism? Or whatever it’s about.

164. home computer

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“I guess you could say this strange age we still find ourselves in officially landed with Kraftwerk in 1981 — everyday people owning artificial brains, keeping them in their homes next to the TV maybe, playing games on them, writing with them, making music. Not that I was paying it all much attention in 1981. I was mostly confused in 1981, or more to the point I was fighting confusion, because I’m still confused. I just gave up the fight a long, long time ago. Which gets us back to Kraftwerk, Computer World. What an album! Sounded exactly like the future that we all had coming, ready or not. And I guess I was. Ready, that is. In spite of all the confusion.” (Philip Random)

Kraftwerk-1981-live

(photo: Kevin Komoda)

19. reSEARCH – knockin’ on heaven’s mirror

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Installment #19 of the Research Series aired in November-2018 on CiTR.FM.101.9.

The nineteenth of a planned forty-nine movies, each forty-nine minutes long, featuring no particular artist, theme or agenda beyond boldly going … who knows? Or as Werner Von Braun once put it, “Research is what I’m doing when I don’t know what I’m doing.” And we definitely have no idea where all this will take us.

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19. knockin’ on heaven’s mirror

Arthur Louis – knockin’ on heaven’s door
Clash – junco partner
Randophonic – a mixed up stew of stuff
Steve Miller Band – macho city [edit]
David Essex – rock on
Procol Harum – song of the dreamer [excerpt]
Kraftwerk – the hall of mirrors [excerpt]
Bill Nelson – transition 6 [the journey]
Handgjort – Kerala
Fred Frith – the relentless landscape
Residents – The Eskimo EDIT
King Crimson – starless + bible black [pieces]
ELO – one summer dream
Michael Rother – katzenmusik-2
Jon Anderson – song of search

Further installments of the Research Series will air most Sundays at approximately 1am (Pacific time) c/o CiTR.FM.101.9, with streaming and download options usually available within twenty-four hours via our Facebook page.

019. The Final Countdown*

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Installment #19. of the Final Countdown aired in October 2018 (c/o CiTR.FM.101.9).

Selections available on this Youtube playlist (not exactly accurate).

The Final Countdown* is Randophonic’s longest and, if we’re doing it right, most relevant countdown yet – the end of result of a rather convoluted process that’s still evolving such is the existential nature of the project question: the 1297 Greatest Records of All Time right now right here. Whatever that means. What it means is dozens of radio programs if all goes to plan, and when has that ever happened?

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Installment #19 of The Final Countdown* went like this.

934. Jesus Loves You – bow down mister
933. Horslips – King of the Faries
932. Bob Marley – Mr Brown
931. African Head Charge – Orderliness, Godliness, Discipline And Dignity
930. FM – one o’clock tomorrow
929. Kraftwerk – numbers + computer world 2
928. Michael Rother – Neutronics 98
927. Link Wray – Batman
926. Seeds – pushin’ too hard
925. Blodwyn Pig – variations on Nainos
924. Santana – Oye Como Va
923. JJ Cale – call me the breeze
922. Led Zeppelin – Bron-Y-aur stomp
921. Gentle Giant – wreck
920. Yello – blue green
919. Speedy j – pepper
918. Robert Fripp + David Sylvian – 20th Century dreaming [a shaman’s song]
917. Brian Eno – Over Fire Island
916. Brand X – unorthodox behaviour

Randophonic airs pretty much every Saturday night, starting 11 pm (Pacific time) c/o CiTR.FM.101.9, with streaming and/or download options usually available within twenty-four hours via our Facebook page.