Kraftwerk: Radio-Activity (yellow vinyl) [PARLOPHONE]

Why you'll love it

This special edition puts the English-language version on 180g translucent yellow vinyl, with a booklet and printed inner sleeve. It was Kraftwerk's first entirely electronic album and the first with the classic four-piece lineup.

This edition

• Yellow vinyl
• 180g vinyl
• Booklet included
• Printed inner sleeve
• English-language edition
• Lyrics included
• Stereo mix

About the album

The title is a joke, and a very Kraftwerk one. Half the songs are about radioactivity and half are about the radio, and Karl Bartos later revealed the name came from a Billboard chart column listing the most-played singles under the heading Radio Activity. Having toured America on the back of Autobahn, Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider came home to Düsseldorf with radio interviews still ringing in their ears.

Recorded at their own Kling Klang Studio and produced by Hütter and Schneider, with Bartos and Wolfgang Flür on electronic percussion, the album does without a single conventional instrument. "Geiger Counter" ticks into life, "Radioactivity" floats on a gorgeous, melancholy melody and became a hit in France and Belgium, "Antenna" and "Radio Stars" bleep with dry wit, and "Ohm Sweet Ohm" closes on a slow, lovely fade. Emil Schult helped with the English lyrics.

Its influence runs through synth pop, techno and ambient music to this day, which is quite a lot of mileage from one pun.

Also at Kops: more Kraftwerk on vinyl · browse Electronic

Tracklist

Listen

On Kling Klang / Parlophone, a reissue of the 1975 album.