T/S Telex vs. YMO vs. Kraftwerk

oh yeah that was fucking insane and terrible when I tried to compare some bands that weren't kraftwerk to kraftwerk

I mean they recorded morgenspaziergang

I still haven't heard any Telex other than this one, which is the best Eurovision entry by anyone ever:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6USa0zUMmqI

xpost No, I know, equal time and all that, but I sense a definite anti-Kraftwerk tendency. (Kraftwerk backlash?)

Maybe the best thing about Kraftwerk is how it all should by rights sound like sound effects and library music, but instead it sounds like grace.

Myself, I just give thanks. :)

i've been listening to Telex's "Neurovision" again a lot lately. "My Time" and "En Route" are amazing.

-- jaxon, Thursday, 1 May 2008 04:27

"my time" is a cover of this: http://youtube.com/watch?v=OdIec0xuz40. i love both versions.

also great: http://youtube.com/watch?v=fVRtaBJzuKY (original is good too).

I tend to think there was more interplay going on between Giorgio Moroder and Kraftwerk than we give credit, whereas Telex and YMO feel in the wake of this.

Moroder's 1975 album seemed to be heavily influenced by early Kraftwerk, and songs on Kraftwerk's 1978 album Man Machine (Space Lab, Metropolis, etc) seemed to borrow even more from the post-1977 I Feel Love/Midnight Express world of Moroder.

But Sakamoto's harmonic approach has me coming back to YMO more than the others.

So no-one commented on Marc Moulin's death last month (TELEX). Seemed like a thoroughly great guy, the kind you'd wanna be when you grow up if you weren't already so old.

10 years ago I would have said Kraftwerk, but nowadays I much prefer YMO.

Egg City Radio (one of my favorite blog things) put up a bunch of Telex very recently. It is awfully good. Trouser Press not to be believed.

Original version of "My Time" is on this album, all of which is really wonderful!

I have heard too little Telex to really make up an opionion about them, except I love what I've heard. Like both Kraftwerk and YMO too, but YMO kind of lost it throughout the 80s. So, Kraftwerk then.

the second side of Technodelic has floored me.

posting from the floor here

I do stand behind "Gradated Gray" as maybe the single greatest technopop song period

i am STILL on the floor. i am trying to figure out which limb i could bite off for sustenance and still live

my local shop had a copy of some new Telex compilation and I decided I owed it to myself to grab it. one record is like salmon pink and the other is neon green. in other words two of the least appealing colors on the planet. it's not really a "best of" but rather one of those anthology-like compilations that just tries to show off everything the band can do. only 4 of the 14 tracks are from the first 2 albums. it is so funny to hear Dan Lacksman sing Russell and Ron Mael's lyrics. I think these may be new mixes because "Radio Radio" (released 1984) sounds so far beyond what Kraftwerk was trying to do on Electric Cafe. They actually pulled off a beefy and sample-heavy dancefloor sound in that period that so many other artists like Devo, Numan, & Sparks couldn't capture. Side D is all covers: "The Number #1 Song in Heaven", "La Bamba" (??) and "Dear Prudence" (?????). there's also a cover of Sonny & Cher's "The Beat Goes On" at the start. it's such a weird compilation. definitely not the tracks I would've picked but I am really digging it.

ok, now listening some of these side-by-side...yeah, there is definitely some extensive remixing done. reminds me a bit of the Kraftwerk 3-D stuff, the new versions are different and more modern even if it's not as easy to pinpoint exactly what has changed.

apparently Mute is going to reissue their entire catalogue. I wonder if it's all gonna get that treatment. If all of Wonderful World is remixed like this it's gonna rule.