We wanted to emphasise the hardness of their sound as well as its romantic side. The Quartet performed their Kraftwerk set at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall in May 1993, and after an enthusiastic response from Kraftwerk themselves, with the German pioneers on two consecutive evenings at the 1993 ARS Electronica Festival in Linz. It started from a strong but vague desire to express something about what is happening in Eastern Europe. The older I get, the more I realise how much I owe, musically, to that part of the world. When we went to Romania to play, it was clear that daily life is very, very difficult, perhaps more difficult than before the so-called revolution.
Inflation is incredible.
Romania's case is further complicated because Ceaucescu was shot. Because he was not put on trial, people still don't know what really happened. In Romania there has been no cleansing process, no catharsis. It also contained hints of a history of oppression that still colours Romanian art. When the wind blows, bend with the wind.