Kraftwerk on tour - without Florian

Kraftwerk are currently (barely) touring the US, and apparently Florian Schneider is not participating in the concerts. This is rather amazing news, and probably the first time ever, since the formation of Organisation in 1967, that the band plays without him. Ralf Hütter was out of Kraftwerk for a brief moment in the early seventies, and as far as I know, that is the only time the band has performed without it's two founders on separate sides of the stage.

As you can see from the picture above (borrowed from here), Ralf still occupies his traditional spot on the left, but Florian's far right location seems to be taken by a man in his late twenties/early thirties, by the name of Stefan Pfaffe. This man was listed as "Kling Klang Crew" on the Minimum-Maximum DVD release, so apparently he's not entirely new to the game.

Pfaffe has even got his own robot, for the performance of "The Robots"! Weird times indeed...

Apart from that, visitors to the new tour report that no new songs are played, but that there are some satisfying reworkings of older material to look forward to.