TRANS EUROPA EXPRESS (Germany, 1977)
EMI ELECTROLA 1C 264-82 306


German cassette today, it's Trans Europa Express! You may recall the mid-80s reissue posted here earlier, this is - I think it's the first; at least a 70s edition. 

The 1977 edition had a 2-panel J-card, to make room for a panel of other releases on EMI. I suppose Kraftwerk were a little difficult to market at the time, before electronic music was a thing? So here, EMI Records hope that if you like this album, then you're probably into schlager... Of the six releases, five are compilations of hits (well, one live album), and titles like "Abendland", "Super Oldies", "Alle Meine Jahreseiten" exclude us from the "Hits for Kids" section. Rock'n'roll this is not! Maybe the marketing genius in charge took a look at the front cover, and decided that four white men in suits would probably make music for the elderly...


The front has the EMI Electrola logo on the top and the catalogue number at the bottom. (Later copies would have the cat.no shifted towards the left to make room for a Dolby logo, but no Dolby at this point.) The cassette has a blue shell with light blue on-body print. 


I can't resist a note on value and pricing. Checking discogs now, there's a copy of this one for sale at £631.24, which is roughly 780 Euros. This, I fear, tells us more about the optimism with which some people will approach our end-state capitalism, as another copy is priced at 295 €, and still no takers (it has been there for some time, as has an ebay listing at $149). Discogs provides a sales statistic, where apparently it did sell for as much as 100 €, on two occasions, and no copies have sold on the platform in four years. My guess is that this incessant overpricing is another nail in the coffin of the collector's market - for cassettes as well as for anything else. Oh well. End of rant...







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