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wolfgang flur - i was a robot

Wolfgang Flür - I was a robot.

It's hard to avoid sympathizing with Mr Flür, who (along with Karl Bartos) spent a very long time playing third/fourth fiddle to Ralf and Florian in Kraftwerk. It's also true that a lot of really good bands over the years have become so because they've been run by somebody with a strong personality (eg. The Fall, The Gun Club, and so on), and the band's success often came at the expense of friendship. I don't know. One would like to think there wouldn't have been such a fuss over some guy writing his thoughts about his old band - there's nothing shocking in here, apart from the revelation (such as it is) that they're all just ordinary people after all. It's not like he's done some kind of hatchet job on the others, as one might've expected after hearing about lawsuits and such. Certainly, the historical bits are best, describing the touring, the early equipment, etc. - the book gets a bit more randomly self-indulgent towards the end, with the two chapter dream sequence and all that. Still, I reckon he's entitled to a bit of indulgence after spending all that time doing what he was told - after all, it is called I was a Robot.

* 14:18 * music