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the sound of the machine - my life in kraftwerk and beyond. karl bartos. omnibus press hardback 634pp illus. £20

though i have met many an individual who protests that they care little for jazz, classical, opera, heavy metal (delete as applicable), i have not come across anyone who claims to have no relationship with music whatsoever. this differs substantially from activities such as cycling, football or foods such as avocado or peanut butter. if i might put myself forward as a prime example, i have no affinity with football/soccer, whatsoever. though the women's team recently praised to the hilt following their victory against germany will no doubt be recorded as a turning point in the history of that particular branch of the sport, four pages one day, followed by five pages the next alongside an eight-page pullout in my daily newspaper, did little to instill any greater love of the so-called 'beautiful game'.

and though that newspaper did everything in its power to do achieve the contrary, it suffers greatly by comparison with the all encompassing ambience of music. i recall when joining an art college band as drummer, being told that i would subsequently never listen to music in the same way again. i confess, i failed to comprehend the value of that advice, though i have since come to learn the validity of the statement. even i have become annoyed with myself when, listening to an album of indeterminate genre, i can only think 'what were they thinking with that snare drum sound?'

and though music can provide a source of solace in difficult times (when mrs washingmachinepost and i were first married, the incumbent of a nearby flat played the same song over and over and over again all night following, as we later discovered, a breakup with his girlfriend), it can also provide, as someone with greater perspicacity than i once described it, 'the soundtrack to our lives'. while that may be a gross overstatement relating to this current book review, the possibly tenuous connection between music and cycling is the author's part in both the composition and recording of german electronic stars, kraftwerk's single, tour de france, first released in 1983, the year prior to robert millar's king of the mountains triumph.

kraftwerk later produced an entire album of the same name, by which time karl(heinz) bartos had left to pursue other directions in electronic music.

the second state of affinity which (again, tenuously) exists between bartos and myself, is that of drumming. karl bartos was born in may 1952, his full forename of karlheinz being a compromise between the desires of his parents (who preferred karl) and grandparents. the sound of the beatles from the early 1960s, introduced by his sister's army boyfriend, quite literally and metaphorically, struck a chord with young karlheinz, inspring him to become involved himself. amongst he and his schoolfriends grew the desire to form a band, a situation replicated across most of europe, the uk and north america. his peers were already en-route to learning guitar and bass...

"As well as a band name, our line-up needed a drummer. That was a law of nature; every band had a drummer. So I begged and pleaded with my parents until they gave in and bought me a drum kit." the difference between he and i (aside from the glaringly obvious), is surely down to the fact that i'd to wait until my college years to buy my own drum kit.

bartos' progress, however, ultimately took him from nascent german beat groups, through the realisation that "... reading notes was the basic prerequisite for changing my path in life..." and the desire to undertake collegiate and academic instruction in classical percussion at the robert schumann conservatory. it was a decision with which his father found little favour: "For him, work had nothing to do with fulfilment and happiness; it was a duty you had to perform to earn your living. My wish to become a musician seemed nothing less than utopian to him." so far, so non-velocipedinal.

meanwhile, bartos continued emulating yours truly, "'I'd saved up three thousand marks and I spent it on my first car, a grey second-hand Citroen 2CV [...] (it) reached a top speed of 100 km/h, and when it got that fast it felt like plummeting to the ground in an out-of-control Messerschmitt ME-109." mine was yellow.

while studying and performing orchestral and operatic percussion, becoming exposed to the outer fringes of the musical world, including that of stockhausen, john cage and jazz, his college tutor one day said to him, "I got a call from the Kraftwerk group. They're looking for a classical percussionist for their concerts." kraftwerk was the brainchild of ralf hutter and florian schneider, who were the proud possessors of kling klang studios "...a large, high-ceilinged room: about twelve metres by six metres, with about six-metre ceilings. White brick walls, the obligatory egg cartons."

gradually karl's association with the world of classical music began to diminish in favour of kraftwerk's electronica, leading to his becoming a full-time member, though essentially still freelance, a situation that would eventually result in a degree of dissonance between the three. the common problems of apportioning of royalties and composition credits that has featured in so many professional band breakups.

along the way, matters that presumably ultimately led to the tour de france connection, began in 1979. "... Florian started turning up at the studio on a shiny chrome racing bike. It looked incredibly cool. It was very delicate, extremely light, and almost reminded me of the body of a dragonfly. [...] Then on 21 April, I got myself my first racing bike from Willi Muller's cycle shop: a Koga Miyata." though he adopted the way of the saddle for a few years, bartos admits that he found running more to his liking.

in 1983, they approached the task of producing the original 'tour de france' composition. "For this song, I had come up with a simple chord structure some time previously, which served as a basic scheme." then came the suggestion to offer the single to tour organisers, aso, but despite "In France, Pathé Marconi placed ads... 'The anthem of the summer, this year the official theme-tune of the tour. That sounded not bad at all, but sadly the single wasn't released to sync with the tour, after all."

after the parting of the ways between bartos and kraftwerk, the former moved on to enjoy a successful career as a composer and producer in the world of electronic music, none of which has any bearing on our lives as cyclists, but pretty much everything to do with contemporary music. this is no small autobiography, weighing in (literally) at over 600 pages. this book could hold my back door open in the face of an atlantic gale. however, it is well-written, well-illustrated, compulsive, and enlightening. far be it for me to burst the velocipedinal bubble, but just occasionally, there's more to life than just cycling (though admittedly not much).

suffice it to say, i doubt i'll ever listen to a kraftwerk album in the same way ever again.

thanks to the generosity of the publisher, i have one copy of 'the sound of the machine' to give away to the first sender of the correct answer to this question. who won the tour de france in 1983? e-mail your answer, name and postal address to brian@twmp.net. closing date is friday 19 august.

wednesday 10 august 2022