This album is Kraftwerk's first truly electronic release and the first to feature the "classic" line up of Ralf, Florian, Karl and Wolfgang. Despite such good pedigree, this album lacks the pop sensibilities of their later work and, aside from one or two melodic pieces, "Radioactivity" has always stuck me as being abstract and self indulgent.
I also think this record has a very low fidelity sound. As you might expect, the remastered version eliminates the sporadic tape hiss heard on the original but nothing can improve upon the off key singing, terrible plate reverbs and ropey synth patches.
After the synthetic clicks of "Geiger Counter" we launch straight into the title track. Since 1991 the band have played this track at a much quicker tempo and I now find the original mix far too slow and ponderous. Florian's vocal on "Radioland" just cuts through me and repeatedly hits on the part of my brain that says, "this is terrible". "Airways" achieves a greater level of annoyance through repetition alone.
We have to tolerate no less than three musique concrète pieces before the next track of any value is heard. "Antenna" bears more than a passing resemblance to "Autobahn" but the melody barely survives the dreadful delay added to the vocal. There's more sound design pieces before the classically tinged "Transistor" and the final piece "Ohm Sweet Ohm".
I have no doubt some electronic music fans will be disappointed with my appraisal but I just can't warm to the original version of this album. The "3-D" live recording from 2017 improves things by adding some variety to the title track and "Airwaves" is given a more electronic and dance orientated sheen. The vocals on tracks like "Radioland" and "Antenna" are much more palatable on the new re-recording but the musique concrète pieces remain uninteresting to me. 1/5
