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Electric Café

Electric Café is the ninth studio album by German electronic band Kraftwerk, released on 10 November 1986. The initial 1986 release came in versions sung in English and German, as well as a limited Edición Española release, featuring versions of "Techno Pop" and "Sex Object" with only Spanish lyrics. It was the first Kraftwerk LP to be created using predominantly digital musical instruments, although the finished product was still recorded onto analog master tapes.

This article is about the Kraftwerk album. For the En Vogue album, see Electric Café (En Vogue album).

Electric Café

10 November 1986 (1986-11-10)

1982–1986

Kling Klang (Düsseldorf, West Germany)

35:38

On 2 October 2009, the album was remastered and re-released under its original working title, Techno Pop.

Background and development[edit]

The development of the album began in early 1982 (with the working titles of Technicolor and then Techno Pop), but the project was delayed because Ralf Hütter suffered a cycling accident in May or June 1982.[1]


EMI Records announced a release date for the Techno Pop album. Promotional advertisements were released and official catalog numbers were assigned to the project. "We were working on an album concept, Technopop, but the composition was developed and we just changed the titles", Hütter explained. "It became Electric Café. But somebody within the record company went out and did a pre-order, we were working on the sleeve and some marketing idiot did this".[2]


At various times, Hütter, Bartos, Flür and Schneider have each stated in interviews that there are no unreleased songs from this period, and that all of the original Technicolor and Techno Pop material was eventually reworked into what can be heard on the finished Electric Café album. Hütter commented "We don't spend our time on making 20 versions of a song only to leave 19 in the closet. We work target related. What we are starting we release. Our storage is empty."[3]

In Spain the album was released in two versions. One was the regular English/International edition, and the other a local Edición Española version, appearing early in 1987, with Spanish-language lyrics for both "Techno Pop" and "Sex Object" (often mistakenly titled "Objeto Sexual" by discographers). The Spanish-only vinyl album was withdrawn soon afterward because of a manufacturing error—a several-second complete drop-out of sound during the final track—and has never been reissued on CD. Both versions were also available as a cassette.

The song "Sex Object" is absent from the South Korean pressings of the album.

Notes:

– voice, vocoder, keyboards, electronics

Ralf Hütter

– vocoder, speech synthesis, electronics

Florian Schneider

electronic drums; vocals on "The Telephone Call"[13]

Karl Bartos

at Discogs (list of releases)

Electric Café