Karl Bartos

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Karl Bartos
Karl Bartos live, 2005
Karl Bartos live, 2005
Background information
Born 31 May 1952 (1952-05-31) (age 56)
Berchtesgaden, Germany
Genre(s) Electronic music
Synthpop
Occupation(s) Musician
Instrument(s) Keyboards, percussion
Years active 1974–present
Label(s) AudioVision
SPV
Associated acts Elektric Music
Kraftwerk
Electronic
Website www.karlbartos.com

Karl Bartos (born 31 May 1952 in Berchtesgaden, Germany) was, between 1975 and 1991, along with Wolfgang Flür an electronic percussionist in the Electronic music group Kraftwerk. He was originally recruited to play on their US "Autobahn" tour. In addition to his percussion playing, Bartos was credited with songwriting on the Man-Machine, Computerworld and Electric Café albums, and sang one lead vocal on the latter. He left the group in 1991, reportedly frustrated at the slow progress in the group's activities due to the increasingly perfectionist attitude of founding members Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider.

In 1992 Bartos founded Elektric Music, performing a style somewhat similar to Kraftwerk. This new project would release Esperanto in 1993 and then Electric Music in 1998. In between the two albums, Bartos collaborated with Bernard Sumner and Johnny Marr on Electronic's 1996 album Raise the Pressure, and co-wrote material with Andy McCluskey which appeared on both Esperanto and Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark's Universal album. In 1998, he also produced an album by former synthpop Swedish band The Mobile Homes, much in the style of his work with Electronic; guitar-pop with very slight synthetic references. It was received as a great disappointment to synthpop fans, but sold more than any of their previous albums, and was used in TV advertisements for an airline to moderate success.

In 2003 he released the synthpop album Communication, featuring such songs as "I'm the Message", "Camera" and "Ultraviolet".

Karl Bartos announced[1] in early 2008 that he had opened the first edition of the audio-visual exhibition "Crosstalk" for public viewing at the white cube section on the official Karl Bartos website. The program holds 21 films, remixes, cover versions, mash ups from Sweden, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, United Kingdom, USA and Japan.

[edit] Discography

With Kraftwerk

With Elektric Music (now Electric Music)

With Electronic

As Karl Bartos

[edit] References

  1. ^ Karl Bartos (ex-Kraftwerk) opens audio-visual exhibition 'Crosstalk'

[edit] External links