Radio-Activity
Radio-Activity (German title: Radio-Aktivität) is the fifth studio album by German electronic band Kraftwerk, released in October 1975. The band's first entirely electronic album, it is a concept album organized around the themes of radioactive decay and radio communication. The album was accompanied by a single release of the title track, which was successful in France. All releases of the album were bilingual, with lyrics in both English and German. Background. The hyphenated album title displays Kraftwerk's typical deadpan humour, being a pun on the twin themes of the songs, half being about radioactivity  and the other half about activity on the radio. More word plays are evident in the track listing: "Radio Stars", which as a title could refer to pop stars, but upon listening is revealed to be about quasars and pulsars. This was the first Kraftwerk album to be entirely self-produced by Ralf Hütter and Schneider in their Kling Klang studio, and the first one to be performed by the "classic" Hütter, Florian Schneider, Karl Bartos and Wolfgang Flür line-up. All the music was written by Hütter and Schneider, with Emil Schult collaborating on lyrics. Schult also designed the  artwork a modified illustration of a late-1930s 'Deutscher Kleinempfänger' radio. It was the first Kraftwerk album to feature use of the distinctive Vako Orchestron keyboard (choir, string and organ sounds), which the group had purchased on their recent US "Autobahn" tour and the Moog Micromoog which was used extensively on this album. Notably, it provided the harsh sounds on the track "Antenna". The band's custom-built electronic percussion also featured heavily in the sound, and extensive use was made of the vocoder. The usual synthesizers were present (including Minimoog and ARP Odyssey), and Hütter's Farfisa electronic piano made  a return on "Transistor". For the first time the group did not use flute, violin or guitars. By 1975, Hütter and Schneider's previous publishing deals with Capriccio Music and Star Musik Studio of Hamburg had expired. The compositions on "Radio-Activity" were published by their own newly set up "Kling Klang Verlag" music publishing company, giving them greater financial control over the use of songwriting output. Also, the album was the first to bear the fruit of Kling Klang as an established vanity label under the group's new licensing deal with EMI. The album reached in Canada, in  February 1976. The title track "Radioactivity" was released as a single, and became a hit in France after it was used as the theme to a popular music show. The song was later re-recorded by Kraftwerk for their 1991 album "The Mix". It was further remixed, for subsequent single release, by William Orbit and François Kevorkian. Composition. "The British painter David Hockney once said: 'People who understand music understand silence,' and the LP is full of moments when the music drifts to almost nothing, or is slowed so that the spaces between beats are exaggerated. Radio-Activity is sonically  muted, at times fragile and beautiful." Reception. "Radio-Activity" was released to mixed reviews, with "Rolling Stone" criticizing the album: "...no cut on the album comes near the melodic/harmonic sense that pervaded "Autobahn" or the creative use of electronics on the much earlier album "Ralf and Florian"". In a retrospective review, Jason Ankeny from AllMusic called the album "a pivotal record in the group's continuing development" and stated that it "marked Kraftwerk's return to more obtuse territory, extensively utilizing static, oscillators, and even Cage-like moments of silence". Chris Power from "Drowned in Sound" praised it for  the experimental feeling in 2009: "A bridge between electronic experimentalism and the powerful, groundbreaking unification of avant-garde form and catchy, commercial function that was just around the corner, "Radio-Activity" is the sound of Kraftwerk finding their way in a strange new landscape that they were in the very process of creating".