Sunday 29 April 2018

Kraftwerk live and in 3D


I have been listening to a lot of synth-pop music, especially during the 80's when it was most popular. In fact, my last gig was a synth-pop gig. But there would have been no synth-pop (and also other forms of electronic music), no Erasure, no OMD, no Marsheaux, no Depeche Mode (even if they are not so electronic now) without Kraftwerk. I had wanted to see Kraftwerk live for many years and it was extremely hard to get tickets for their UK shows. Then I noticed that this year they were playing their 3-D show in places that were awfully close to Greece (Sofia and Skopje for example), so why didn't any promoter make an effort to bring them here? Finally someone did. And at long last, on the 3rd of March, exactly one week after my seeing Erasure in London, Kraftwerk played in Athens.
When the gig was announced, before I bought my ticket, I had to make some enquiries. Where should I be in the venue? In the arena or in the seats in order to enjoy the full 3D experience? Both people I asked gave me the same verdict: It doesn't matter where you are, as long as you are facing the middle of the stage in order to better experience the 3-D  effects. I decided to buy a seated ticket, so my view would not be obstructed by a tall person in front of me. And since the seated tickets were not numbered, I had to get there early in order to find a seat that would be facing the middle of the stage. And that's just what I did. I got a seat at the topmost row directly facing the stage.

When the show finally started it was confirmed that this was a perfect seat to experience the 3D effects from, although, as you will be able to see from the videos, the show can be enjoyed even in 2D. 




I could go on for hours telling you how magnificent the 3D graphics were, but what was even more exciting was how many Kraftwerk tunes I was familiar with from all those years.





And the one I had completely forgotten about was "Neon Lights" which I came to know through its OMD cover of 1991!
Then again, the song I was most waiting for was "The Model" which had no 3D effects at all.

All in all, it was a wonderful night and a unique experience . Towards the end, they treated us to "The Robots" as a separate performance (and with different outfits). 

In the end they left the stage one by one while the music was still playing...
SETLIST:
01. Numbers
02. Computer World
03. It's More Fun to Compute
04. Home Computer
05. Computer Love
06. The Man-Machine
07. Spacelab
08. The Model
09. Neon Lights
10. Autobahn
11. Airwaves
12. Geiger Counter / Radioactivity
13. Electric Café
14. Tour De France / Prologue / Etape 1 / Chrono / Etape 2
15. Trans Europe Express / Metal on Metal / Abzug
Encore:
16. The Robots
Encore 2:
17. Aéro Dynamik
18. Planet of Visions
19. Boing Boom Tschak
20. Techno Pop
21. Music Non Stop

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