| Rock&Folk:
Let’s talk about “Man Machine”.
Is the man in “The Man Machine” submissive to the machine? |
| Florian
Schneider: I don’t think so. It’s
rather a more sophisticated relationship. There is an interaction. Interaction
on both sides. The machine helps the man, and the man admires the machine.
(Showing the Sony tape recorder) This is the extension of your brain. It
helps you remembering. It’s the third man sitting at this table. As
for ourselves, we love our machines. We have an erotic relationship with
them. |
| Rock&Folk:
Yes, there were three steps: man and woman, man and
heroin, man and the machine. |
| Florian
Schneider: (enters
Ralf Hütter) We were talking about the manmachine. We just started... |
| Rock&Folk:
It’s quite hard to talk. Thinking is enough.
When we met at the drugstore, last night, we didn’t talk. And still
we said a lot of things... |
| Ralf
Hütter: It happened to me yesterday evening
with D. The people who were with her asked me some questions. The wanted
to understand, and it was so slow. We could not... |
| Rock&Folk:
...be in contact. Talking is a regression. |
| Ralf
Hütter: Yes. Actually, it’s a tradition
inherited from the Bible. In the Bible, language is considered as the highest
form of art: “At the beginning was the word”. But for us, Bible
is over. There are much faster things, electric things. In our music, words
are only given as a pretext. We don’t express ourselves through them. |
| Florian
Schneider: They are only signs: turn left, turn
right... |
| Rock&Folk:
Words are a barrier to the brain... |
| Ralf
Hütter: Yes. And everything is programed
by schools. |
| Rock&Folk:
In school we learn to be slow... |
| Florian
Schneider: Perhaps should we invent a synthetic
language... |
| Ralf
Hütter: In German, in order to describe situations,
there is that concept of “movie”. It’s a daily concept:
“I met X in this or that movie”. Everyone has his own “movie”... |
| Rock&Folk:
One thing I’d like to discuss is the existence
of the Duplicate. The modern form of creation, in my opinion, is to create
a Duplicate which is then tele-controlled. And when the media focuseon the
Duplicate, their attention comes back to you magnified. In fact, the man
machine has no ego. |
| Florian
Schneider: The man machine has a hyper-ego. |
| Ralf
Hütter: This is not the level of “individual
concentration” anymore. The point of view of the nineteen century
is over. The myth of the important artist has been overexploited. It doesn’t
fit anymore with the standards of modern society. Today, mass production
rules. |
| Rock&Folk:
In Paris this week, it’s the time for fashion
shows. The most superficial week of the year. Superficiality erases a lot
of things. It allows to get an empty brain, which is the ideal condition
to create... |
| Florian
Schneider: Yes. We say “blank tape”
for the brain. A blank tape, and a microphone in each ear. In music, it’s
important to develop an art of listening based on emptyness. |
| Rock&Folk:
Let’s go back to superficiality. You’ve
been in Paris for two days and you went twice to the Palace. The Palace
is the symbol of superficiality. You seem to like that place... |
| Ralf
Hütter: Yes, for us it’s like an electronic
fair. To be alone in the crowd... |
| Florian
Schneider: It’s a movie theater for us.
Everyone is a star. The spotlights search the stars... for a few seconds
only (grin). (the discussion drifts to Warhol : “everybody will be
star for 15 minutes”) the stars that spotlights reveal and then abandon... |
| Ralf
Hütter: You mentioned the Duplicate. We understand
that. We were born biologically from a moment of hazard, our from a moment
of post-war joy. But we were born in ourselves. We have an internal duplicate. |
| Florian
Schneider: In german, there’s an expression:
to walk beside yourself. It means that you’re absent and conscious
of it. |
| Florian
Schneider: The image is here, and the camera is
there. |
| Rock&Folk:
Do you listen to Disco? |
| Ralf
Hütter: Yes, metallic Disko. Disko with a
K... |
| Rock&Folk:
What do you think of Giorgio Moroder? “From
here to eternity” is quite closed to what you are... |
| Florian
Schneider: Yes. In Germany, some people asked
me if it was our new record. I was quite surprised that I haven’t
heard it yet. |
| Ralf
Hütter: Diskö is a social institution.
It’s a public living-room. Mostly in Germany. We only go out in clubs.
The record is a living energy, an energy for urban beings. |
| |
| Interview
to Yves Adrien |
| Translation
to english by JBV - France |
|
