ELECTRIC CAFE (Deutsche Version) (1986, Germany)
EMI 264 24 0654 4


As a cassette collector, of course I love all the anomalies and variants and oddities; Finding an item on eBay that you think you have, but it turns out to be just slightly different; whether it is paper labels versus on-body print, or a Dolby logo where you haven't seen one before... It took me a while to get the German-language edition of Electric Café, and when I did, it turned out to be slightly different to the ones I've seen elsewhere! 

Of course, by 1986, the European Community had made it easier for multi-national corporations to produce items in one country and sell them in the next, so it shouldn't surprise me that the German edition of this cassette was actually printed in Holland... although I must say I would have preferred it if the domestic release was produced at home. "Ordnung muss sein!" 

 The Discogs community has dug up two variants of the cassette, both "Printed in Holland", with one crediting the album as a "Kling Klang Produkt", and the other crediting EMI Services Benelux B.V., Uden. The cassettes are also slightly different, one is said to be "Printed in Holland" as on the insert, while the other is "Made in EEC".

Here is a third variant, and on this, there is no mention of Holland at all. The back flap of the insert does not present any information on where it was printed, and the cassette label just states "Made in EEC". (I expect it was manufactured in Uden like the others, and that it was simply an oversight that it wasn't credited on the cover, but as usual, this is just guesswork on my part!)

Other than that, Electric Café was a fairly lavish effort in most territories, and this is no exception, with 3 panels and an "extended" back flap on the J-card, featuring the images from the inner sleeve of the LP in addition to tracklist and credits. There's also a long explanation on how the "XDR quality system" offers better sound reproduction compared to non-XDR cassettes - in German, English and French. The fact that the (admittedly pointless) information is presented in three languages seems very fitting for this Kraftwerk album, which of course has two songs in French in addition to German, English and a few sentences of Spanish. 











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