Review: Kraftwerk at Riverside Theatre

Kraftwerk at Riverside Theatre
Friday, December 15, 2023

Perth Convention Centre must hate money. If it wasn’t already borderline redundant and a total eyesore on the city landscape, they’ve now resorted to closing the bars 10 minutes before shows start and not reopening them again. And what better night to do so than a Friday?

The seated Riverside Theatre was already an odd choice of venue for an electronic act, although their ageing fanbase seemed content to sit back and take in the wonder of a performance that was nothing short of exhilarating. Riverside cops a bit of flack for being bland, but for the right act it’s more of a blank canvas. Like Nick Cave and Warren Ellis 12 months earlier, Kraftwerk perfectly exemplified this.

It began with the sold-out crowd witnessing one of the great introductions to a set as Numbers lit up the huge screen and our four German hosts took to identical-looking synthesisers and controllers on stands that changed colour in accordance with the big screen. Interspersed with Computerworld, it was one of several mashups across two hours.

Other than the breathtaking visuals, what was immediately evident was how huge the remixed tunes sounded via their live production. Completely unlike the dated but seminal original recordings that probably leave kids wondering what the fuss is all about, in concert, the bottom and top ends piqued the eardrums and got toes tapping.

It was hard not to imagine an alternate universe where there was room to dance and take advantage of the motorik tempos (does anyone else remember Kraftwerk’s show-stealing Global Gathering festival headline 15 years ago—nearly to the day—at Esplanade Reserve in the city?)

Highlights were aplenty. Spacelab shared satellite views of the Earth complete with an aerial shot of Perth, Australia, which drew the expectant cheers; an epic Autobahn hilariously pitted a German Volkswagen up against an American Cadillac on an animated freeway with all the bright colours of a computer game.

The latter kicked off the night’s best section with Computer Love (given a new lease of life when Coldplay appropriated it on their single Talk), followed by the amazing, retro black and white footage of wedding dresses and bathing costumes for The Model, their most enduring track.

Neon Lights was a bit of a letdown straight after, but a mash of Geiger Counter and Radioactivity quickly got things back on track with the most powerful visuals of the night. Their most obvious political statement and protest song, it namechecked the sites of several nuclear disasters, including Chernobyl, Hiroshima, and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Other messages such as “Chain Reaction,” “Contaminated,” and “Stop Radioactivity,” left little doubt as to Kraftwerk’s stance.

Not every post was a winner, with Airwaves struggling to hold attention early and the orange SodaStream visuals of Vitamin not enough to justify its place at the business end of the set between mashups and incarnations of Tour de France and Trans-Europe Express.

But it was never long before our breath was taken away once more. Never was this more apparent than in opening encore track The Robots (another classic that was famously appropriated, this one by LCD Soundsystem on their excellent Get Innocuous).

Winding down by leaving the stage one at a time to rapturous applause, the biggest cheer was left for 77-year-old vocalist Ralf Hutter, who formed the pioneering electronic outfit with the late Florian Schneider in 1969.

From their experiments with krautrock to popularising drum machines and synthesizers and then innovating in the live production arena, this was a reminder that German efficiency doesn’t lack for spectacle.

HARVEY RAE

Photos by Stu McKay