The Budget of Paradox

Sophia, I know you can’t – or won’t – join me. But a dad can fantasize, can’t he? One of my favorite bands is playing in concert in CDMX on May 30. In fact, it’s not far from the Condesa neighborhood where I normally stay when I’m in Mexico City. (CDMX = hip abbreviation for Ciudad de México.)

At this moment, there’s not much in this world I could imagine wanting more than to meet up with you again, and take you to a concert. I know Panic! at the Disco is more your speed. But the band playing in CDMX is Kraftwerk.

Kraftwerk… it literally means “power station” in German. They’re the Godfathers of electronic music. Maybe you’ve never heard of them, but their influence is all around in today’s synth-pop, hip hop, post-punk, techno, house music, ambient, and club music. They certainly influenced me when I tried to write music.

Today, it’s easy to write music with computers and synthesizers. But these guys were creating industrial music back when I was a child with primitive machines and even cutting audio tapes into hundreds of pieces and arranging them together by hand. They record in a studio called Kling Klang, a nod to their early low-tech instruments to make high-tech music. I saw them in concert in San Francisco 25 years ago at the famous Warfield Theater. I loved the show. For a while, they sent robots out on stage to perform.

I always liked the name “Kling Klang” even if it’s just their studio.

There are so many Kraftwerk songs I can suggest that you listen to. I’ll reduce it to three:
The Robots
Numbers
Tour de France

Their music might not be your cup of tea. But your dad likes technology and automation and industrial music. Get to know a little Kraftwerk and you get to know a little bit of me.

Again, they’ll play in concert on May 30 in CDMX. I’ve pointed out before that you can be in Mexico City in just a few hours. Flights go from Lynchburg to Charlotte and Charlotte directly to Mexico City. Sometimes, as I fall asleep, I dream about seeing you walking out of some airport somewhere someday to see me. There really isn’t much I’d like more than to see you. And if I could take you to a Kraftwerk concert, that would probably just make my head explode with joy.

And afterwards, we can go eat Tacos Gobernador at Pueblo Chico’s and you can practice your Spanish. Se me hace agua la boca.