''Minimum-Maximum'' is the first official live album release by

Kraftwerk Kraftwerk (, "power station") is a German band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to popularize t ...

, released in June 2005, almost 35 years after the group gave its first live performance. The album features two

CDs The compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format that was co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. In August 1982, the first compact disc was manufactured. It was then released in Octo ...

of tracks recorded on the group's world tour during 2004, including concerts in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is official ...

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

Berlin Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population ...

Tallinn Tallinn () is the most populous and capital city of Estonia. Situated on a bay in north Estonia, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea, Tallinn has a population of 437,811 (as of 2022) and administratively lies in the Harju '' ...

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the B ...

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, and

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

. Like many of its studio albums, ''Minimum-Maximum'' was released in two different language versions: the band's native German, and English for the international market, although of the 23 tracks on the album, only the recordings of "

The Model "Das Model" ("The Model" in English) is a song recorded by the German group Kraftwerk in 1978, written by musicians Ralf Hütter and Karl Bartos, with artist Emil Schult collaborating on the lyrics. It is featured on the album, ''Die Mensch-M ...

", " Radioactivity", " Trans Europe Express"/"Metal on Metal", "Computer World", "Pocket Calculator" and "

The Robots "The Robots" (german: "Die Roboter") is a single by German electronic-music group Kraftwerk, which was released in 1978. The single and its B-side, "Spacelab", both appeared on the band's seventh album, ''The Man-Machine'' (1978). However, th ...

" are actually different between the releases. The album title, an excerpt from the lyrics of the song " Elektro-Kardiogramm" (which only exists in an English-language version), is the same for both German and English versions. In an interview for ''Mojo'' Magazine, Ralf Hütter regretted the fact that they could not include recordings from their 2004 concert in Santiago de Chile:

“We have great recordings from Santiago, Chile, but couldn’t incorporate them into ''Minimum-Maximum'' because we’d already mixed the album,” says Ralf. “The Chileans were the only audience in the world who clap in time, in perfect synchronisation.”

The album was also released as a double live concert DVD with DTS 5.1 sound on 5 December 2005. The track "Planet of Visions" is a reworked version of the song "

Expo 2000 Expo 2000 was a World Expo held in Hanover, Germany from 1 June to 31 October 2000. It was located on the Hanover Fairground (Messegelände Hannover), which is the largest exhibition ground in the world. Initially some 40 million people were exp ...

", based on a 2001 remix by

Underground Resistance Underground Resistance (commonly abbreviated to UR) are an American musical collective from Detroit, Michigan. Producing primarily Detroit techno since 1990 with a grungy four-track musical aesthetic, they are also renowned for their militant p ...

. The vocoder text " Sellafield 2" at the start of " Radioactivity"/"Radioaktivität" is included for the first time on the CD and DVD set. The intro vocoder text before "The Man-Machine"/"Die Mensch-Maschine" is included only on the DVD release. ''Minimum-Maximum'' was nominated for the 2006

Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album The Grammy Award for Best Dance/Electronic Album is an award presented at the Grammy Awards — a ceremony that was established in 1958 — to recording artists for quality albums in the dance music and electronica genres. Honors in several categ ...

Critical reception

''Minimum-Maximum'' received critical acclaim. At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

score of 86, based on 17 reviews, which indicates "universal acclaim".

Track listing

English version

Disc one

# "The Man-Machine" (

Karl Bartos Karl Bartos (born 31 May 1952) is a German musician and composer known for his contributions to the electronic band Kraftwerk. Career Karlheinz Bartos was born on 31 May 1952 in Marktschellenberg, Germany, named after his grandfathers Karl an ...

Florian Schneider Florian Schneider-Esleben (7 April 194721 April 2020) was a German musician. He is best known as one of the founding members and leaders of the electronic band Kraftwerk, performing his role with the band until his departure in 2008. Early li ...

Ralf Hütter Ralf Hütter (born 20 August 1946) is a German musician and composer best known as the lead singer and keyboardist of Kraftwerk, which he founded with Florian Schneider in 1969. On May 12, 2021, Kraftwerk was announced as one of the inductees of ...

)

Warszawa Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is official ...

Sala Kongresowa The Congress Hall ( pl, Sala Kongresowa) is a 2,880-seat theatre at the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, Poland. It was opened in 1955. Renovation The hall was closed for approximately 2 years from July 2014 for renovations, modernisat ...

- 27.05.04 – 7:55 # "Planet of Visions" (

Fritz Hilpert Friedrich "Fritz" Hilpert (born 31 May 1956) is a member of the electropop group Kraftwerk. Background Fritz Hilpert studied trumpet and percussion at the Musisches Max-Reger-Gymnasium, Germany, until 1976. He also played drums in several live ...

, Hütter,

)

Ljubljana Ljubljana (also known by other historical names) is the capital and largest city of Slovenia. It is the country's cultural, educational, economic, political and administrative center. During antiquity, a Roman city called Emona stood in the a ...

Križanke The Križanke Outdoor Theatre (''Poletno gledališče Križanke'') is a theatre in Ljubljana, Slovenia, used for summer festivals set up inside the courtyard of the former Monastery of the Holy Cross. It is located at French Revolution Square ('' ...

- 24.05.04 – 4:45 # "Tour de France (Étape 1)" (Hilpert, Hütter, Maxime Schmitt, Schneider)

, Olimpiska Hall - 29.05.04 – 4:22 # "Chrono" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schneider, Schmitt)

, Olimpiska Hall - 29.05.04 – 1:29 # "Tour de France (Étape 2)" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schmitt, Schneider)

, Olimpiska Hall - 29.05.04 – 4:48 # "Vitamin" (Hilpert, Hütter) Moscow, Lushniki - 03.06.04 – 6:41 # "

Tour de France The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage bicycle race primarily held in France, while also occasionally passing through nearby countries. Like the other Grand Tours (the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a España), it consist ...

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schmitt, Schneider) Paris,

Le Grand Rex Le Grand Rex is a Parisian cinema and concert venue. Location and access It is located at , boulevard Poissonnière in the 2nd arrondissement, on the grands boulevards. Its facades and roofs, as well as its hall and its decor have been li ...

- 22.03.04 – 6:18 # "

Autobahn The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track'. ...

" (Hütter, Schneider,

Emil Schult Emil Schult (born 10 October 1946) is a German painter, poet and audio-visual artist. Biography After studying Sinology in Münster, Schult joined the Academy of Art in Düsseldorf in 1969 to study Fine Arts in the printmaking class of Diete ...

) Berlin,

Tempodrom The Tempodrom (also referred to as Neues Tempodrom) is a multi-purpose event venue in Berlin. Founded by Irene Moessinger, it opened in 1980 next to the Berlin Wall on the west side of Potsdamer Platz, housed in a large circus tent. After severa ...

- 25.03.04 – 8:51 # "

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schult) London,

Brixton Academy Brixton Academy (originally known as the Astoria Variety Cinema, previously known as Carling Academy Brixton, currently named O2 Academy Brixton as part of a sponsorship deal with the O2 brand) is a mid-sized concert venue located in South Wes ...

- 20.03.04 – 3:41 # " Neon Lights" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) London,

Royal Festival Hall The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,700-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge, in the London Borough of Lambeth. It is a Grade I l ...

- 18.03.04 – 5:58

Disc two

# " Radioactivity" (Hütter, Schneider, Schult)

- 27.05.04 – 7:41 # " Trans-Europe Express" (Hütter, Schult) Budapest, Sportaréna - 25.05.04 – 5:01 # "Metal on Metal" (Hütter) Budapest, Sportaréna - 25.05.04 – 4:28 # "Numbers" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) San Francisco,

The Warfield The Warfield Theatre, colloquially referred to as The Warfield, is a 2,300-seat music venue located in San Francisco, California. It was built as a vaudeville theater and opened as the '' Loews Warfield'' on May 13, 1922. History In the 1920s, T ...

- 28.04.04 – 4:27 # "Computer World" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Moscow, Lushniki - 03.06.04 – 2:55 # "Home Computer" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider)

- 27.05.04 – 5:55 # "Pocket Calculator" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Moscow, Lushniki - 03.06.04 – 2:58 # "Dentaku" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Tokyo,

Shibuya Ax Shibuya (渋谷区 ''Shibuya-ku'') is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. As a major commercial and finance center, it houses two of the busiest railway stations in the world, Shinjuku Station (southern half) and Shibuya Station. As of April 1, ...

- 04.03.04 – 3:15 # "

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Moscow, Lushniki - 03.06.04 – 7:23 # "

Elektro Kardiogramm Elektro is the nickname of a robot built by the Westinghouse Electric Corporation in its Mansfield, Ohio facility between 1937 and 1938. Seven feet tall (2.1 m), weighing 265 pounds (120.2 kg), humanoid in appearance, he could walk by voice ...

" (Hilpert, Hütter)

, Exhibition Hall - 30.05.04 – 4:41 # "Aéro Dynamik" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schneider, Schmitt)

, Olimpiska Hall - 29.05.04 – 7:14 # "

Musique Non-Stop "Musique Non Stop" is a 1986 single by German techno group Kraftwerk, which was featured on the album ''Electric Café''. It was re-released as a remix on their 1991 album '' The Mix''. The single was their first number one on ''Billboard'' Hot D ...

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Moscow, Lushniki - 03.06.04 – 9:51

German version

Disc one

# "Die Mensch-Maschine" (

)

– 7:55 # "Planet der Visionen" (

, Hütter,

)

– 4:45 # "Tour de France (Étape 1)" (Hilpert, Hütter, Maxime Schmitt, Schneider)

, Olimpiska Hall – 4:22 # "Chrono" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schneider, Schmitt)

, Olimpiska Hall – 1:29 # "Tour de France (Étape 2)" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schmitt, Schneider)

, Olimpiska Hall – 4:48 # "Vitamin" (Hilpert, Hütter) Moscow, Lushniki – 6:41 # "

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schmitt, Schneider) Paris,

– 6:18 # "

" (Hütter, Schneider,

) Berlin,

– 8:51 # "

Das Model "Das Model" ("The Model" in English) is a song recorded by the German group Kraftwerk in 1978, written by musicians Ralf Hütter and Karl Bartos, with artist Emil Schult collaborating on the lyrics. It is featured on the album, ''Die Mensch- ...

" (Bartos, Hütter, Schult) Berlin,

– 3:41 # " Neonlicht" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) London,

– 5:58

Disc two

# " Radioaktivität" (Hütter, Schneider, Schult)

, Exhibition Hall – 7:41 # " Trans-Europa Express" (Hütter, Schult)

, Olimpiska Hall – 3:21 # "Abzug" (Hütter)

, Olimpiska Hall – 1:40 # "Metall auf Metall" (Hütter)

, Olimpiska Hall – 4:28 # "Nummern" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) San Francisco,

– 4:27 # "Computerwelt" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider, Schult)

, Olimpiska Hall – 2:55 # "Heimcomputer" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider)

– 5:55 # "Taschenrechner" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Berlin,

– 2:58 # "Dentaku" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Tokyo,

– 3:15 # " Die Roboter" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Berlin,

– 7:23 # " Elektro-Kardiogramm" (Hilpert, Hütter)

, Exhibition Hall – 4:41 # "Aero Dynamik" (Hilpert, Hütter, Schneider, Schmitt)

, Olimpiska Hall – 7:14 # " Music Non-Stop" (Bartos, Hütter, Schneider) Moscow, Lushniki – 9:51 In the German version of the track listing (as on '' The Mix'' album) after "Trans-Europa Express" is an extra title, "Abzug", followed by "Metall auf Metall". For the international version of the album the title "Abzug" was dropped and the music incorporated as part of "Trans-Europe Express", thus making the disc appear to be one track shorter. The original 1977 German album has these track titles in a different order, though the music is basically the same arrangement.

''Notebook''

A special edition box set entitled

Notebook A notebook (also known as a notepad, writing pad, drawing pad, or legal pad) is a book or stack of paper pages that are often ruled and used for purposes such as note-taking, journaling or other writing, drawing, or scrapbooking. History ...

, comprising both the DVDs and audio CDs plus a commemorative hardback book of tour photos, was also issued, in both German- and English-language versions. The box is designed to resemble a laptop computer, with the front cover of the book being the keyboard (with German keyboard layout).

Personnel

–

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or witho ...

software synthesizer A software synthesizer or softsynth is a computer program that generates digital audio, usually for music. Computer software that can create sounds or music is not new, but advances in processing speed now allow softsynths to accomplish the sa ...

sequencing In genetics and biochemistry, sequencing means to determine the primary structure (sometimes incorrectly called the primary sequence) of an unbranched biopolymer. Sequencing results in a symbolic linear depiction known as a sequence which succi ...

– supplementary vocals, software synthesizers, sequencing *

– software synthesizers, sequencing, sound engineer (album mix) *

Henning Schmitz Kraftwerk (, " power station") is a German band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to populariz ...

– software synthesizers, sequencing, sound engineer (album mix)

Equipment

The performances were created using 10 Sony VAIO laptops containing Mobile Intel Pentium 4 M processors. Four were used for audio, running

Steinberg Cubase Cubase is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by Steinberg for music and MIDI recording, arranging and editing. The first version, which was originally only a MIDI sequencer and ran on the Atari ST computer, was released in 1989. Cut-d ...

SX, the remaining 6 provided the video system. Since 2002 all sounds were created using virtual technology (i.e., software replicating and replacing original analogue or digital equipment). According to

, interviewed in 2009, "the mobility of music technology and the reliability of the notebooks and software have greatly simplified the realization of complex touring setups: we generate all sounds on the laptops in real time and manipulate them with controller maps. It takes almost no time to get our compact stage system set up for performance. ��This way, we can bring our Kling-Klang Studio with us on stage. The physical light weight of our equipment also translates into an enormous ease of use when working with software synthesizers and sound processors. Every tool imaginable is within immediate reach or just a few mouse clicks away on the Internet."

Charts

Weekly charts

Release history

References

{{Authority control Kraftwerk albums 2005 live albums 2005 video albums Live video albums Astralwerks live albums German-language albums