Kraftwerk - Pocket Calculator / Computer World

I Love 1981 - pt. 11

Two birds with one Stein here as Kraftwerk's new single and album were published at more or less the same time in May, 1981. Although neither failed to make a massive impact in terms of (initial) sales, their impact would be much farther reaching both in terms of the minimal electronic sound and their 'computer world'. prophecy. Back then, Pocket Calculator barely scraped into the charts at no. 39 despite it being the group's comeback single, after being so heavily cited by many of pop's new artists - see Duran Duran, Human League, Ultravox, OMD et al - as such a huge influence.
Be that as it may, the pop charts were obviously still not ready for the minimal electronic sound, and the single was taken more as a Sparky's Magic Piano type novelty song rather than a pioneering musical form. Smash Hits scathingly called it a "silly song" stating that Kraftwerk had been "surpassed by technology". Mmmm, obviously missing the point there, Mr Silverton.

The parent album Computer World was similarly dimissed in the same issue as "a bunch of non-songs..as irritatingly gimmicky as "'Tomorrow's World'". Non-songs? Maybe..... Duesseldorf boys Kraftwerk were never ones for the 3-minute verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus to fade numbers, save for, say, The Model, which would in fact become a number one single within a few months. That said, Pocket Calculator did try so hard to be a proper song, without betraying the Kraftwerk ethic.

But tomorrow's world indeed it was: Kraftwerk brought us into a world where computers would control everything from entertainment to money and from business to travel. Data greedily collected by police forces and banks alike. Ring any bells?
Kraftwerk's prophecy would take some time yet to materialise, yet sure enough tracks such as Home Computer weren't far wrong.

Sorry Smash Hits, but sonically it was way ahead of it's time (as Autobahn and Showroom Dummies had been in the 70s). The short 'non-song' Numbers was a key track in shaping dance music in the eighties and beyond. Planet Rock would build on it's rapid tickety-tick rhythym, mix it with Trans Europe Express and, Bob's yer Onkel... hip-hop was born. True, Computer World may have seemed weak at the time, as pure electronic music to be presented in a pop form was still fairly primitive, drum sounds for example were still a problem, but just witness the 'Werk's innovative electronic percusssion to see how far ahead they were. This is 1981, folks, where 'computer science' was something that was studied only by A level maths geeks with big clunky machines spewing huge 'print-outs' of gobbledy-gook computer "language", and electronic music was still by and large that stuff made by the likes of Jean Michel Jarre and Tangerine Dream.

When technology finally did catch up, much of the album would a decade or so later be heavily upgraded to fit in with the new electronica dance 'scene'. 1991's The Mix relies heavily on Computer World tracks - It's More Fun.. and Home Computer mixed into a single 'unit', Pocket Calculator united with its Japanese counterpart Dentaku, and Computer Love 'sexed up' into something new. Perhaps not surprisingly Numbers would become a live favourite, again hugely enhanced compared to its original form.

Computer World: prophecy of an imminent future or sci-fi geekiness translated into music? However you took it in 1981, Kraftwerk's compu-conceptual opus remains an icon and at just over half an hour long it's an economical excercise in a minimalist art-form which would shape the future as much as forseeing it. Fact!

Hard Day's Werk . .Kraftwerk knuckle down in 1981.

As with previous albums, Kraftwerk continued to produce lyrics in English and in German (Computerwelt was the Teutonic twin album issue) and Calculator was also done in French and Japanese. Here's a rare treat however: the Italian version which has only ever been done live or on Ital-telly. So here are the 'Werk with 'Mini-Calcolatore' which also nicely showcases their minimalist, robotic live performance style of the time, to a no doubt bemused studio audience. It's more fun to compute!