Kling Klang: The Electronic Garden - The Lighter Side

Some more of Kraftwerk's ground-breaking equipment modifications, not generally known about... (only joking!)

Dubreq Stylophone

Move over Rolf Harris, come in please David Bowie, your time is up. For 1981's 'Pocket Calculator' Kraftwerk used the Dubreq Stylophone. Except that the batteries had run out. "One of our engineers helped us with this replacement operation, we in fact made use of Duracell equipment, especially bought from the news kiosk around the corner from Kling Klang. We have considered patenting this technique."

Casio Pocket Calculator

Again, from 'Pocket Calculator', strangely enough - "we wanted to make use of this for an entire album - but one of our engineers had to resit his Maths examination and wouldn't give it back afterwards. These are amongst the problems that working in isolation within Kling Klang can involve. For us, it is the only way, each and every day. So long as we can go out for ice-creams too".

Texas Instruments 'Speak And Spell'

Heard throughout the 'Computer World' LP, Kraftwerk extensively modified this item for their purposes - "Yes, Florian was responsible for this - we found that the existing vocabulary within the unit was somewhat limited for our purposes - while on one of our workdays at Kling Klang, Florian managed to record the word 'bollocks' into the unit - from here we also modified the machine to say 'arse' and 'jobbie' - such modification of equipment is quite routine for us within Kling Klang".