Kraftwerk cassettes

Computer World (Indonesia, 1982) Unofficial release Concert CC-1930 Breaking new ground here today, with a label I haven't featured before: Here's another Indonesian edition of Computer World. I say Indonesian, in spite of some strong indications of this being a Japanese cassette - both the cassette shell and outer case are injection molded with "JAPAN". Makes it look like the country of manufacture was Japan, but Discogs has the Concert label down as Indonesian, and although I know that Japan has a thriving unofficial record industry, I've never seen a Japanese pirate cassette, so I'll go with Indonesia until I'm told otherwise by someone in the know. It's an odd release, in some ways. It's clearly marked with "1982", famously the year after this album was released all across the world. The buzz words on the front are surprising - did they really know what a "digital recording" was in Indonesia in 1982?? (Computer World was not...

Computer World (Indonesia, 1981) Yess 363 Some music is relatable across the continents. Kraftwerk appears to be seen as quintessentially German by many people, and so it's fascinating to see how far their music would travel - case in point, they were listened to in Indonesia. And here's the Indonesian cassette of Computer World. YESS is an Indonesian label, apparently not connected with the Western European or international labels that would elsewhere release Kraftwerk... So is this a "pirate" cassette, or "bootleg"? Well, yes, purely speaking it is. However, according to some sources (quoted in Discogs), the cassettes released on YESS were apparently seen as "official" in Indonesia, the company paid their taxes at home (if not necessarily setting aside funds for royalties to Europe!) and, well, Europe was very far away... That doesn't make it legit, obviously, but in Indonesia, they probably regarded this as official - if they even thought ab...