"Art is a Technology" is a response. Is THE response. Last year's Datapunk release "Popkiller" was controversial. Some thought Rother's underground era was ended. Actually, Rother is that kind of guy that can be on both sides, the underground and the world of pop.
"Art is a Technology" is the achievement of Rother's minimal seek. Here is just what a sound needs to be called "music". The tracks are logically named part 1 to 14, as the release is completely homogenic.
This is digital, technologic, metal. Absolutely cold but definitely cool. You won't find pop beats, you won't find vocoded voices. But you may find the first release that will introduce you to the subtles sounds of ambient.
A vital release for ambient fans, but also for each electronic lover, simply because "Art is a Technology" contains the essential of electronic music.

"Popkiller" is not a pop killer. "Sex with the machines" and "Simulationszeitalter" were pop killers. But it doesn't matter.
Rother has created a new label with this release: Datapunk. "Popkiller" is a new direction (maybe not the most inventive) that can really shocks if you loved "Sex with..." and "Simulations...".
In fact, "Popkiller" follows to "Electropop" (2001, under the name Little Computer People). This is an high quality pop/dance music that you'll never heard on the radio, that you can dance and sing on it. I think that it's what Rother aimed with this release, successfully.

This album first sounds like another revolution in pop-electronic music. But there are lots of coincidences with Radiohead's "Idiotheque" and the voices of Sigur Ros' "Agaetis Byrjun". Finally "Special Forces" seems to be an aftermath of them. Absolutely not annoying, but not a "vital release" as it is rated in most reviews.