KRAFTWERK

'Kraftwerk 2', the follow-up to the German band's 1970 debut release, is by far the least characteristic album of their 70s output. Generally continuing the krautrock experiments initiated on the self-titled predecessor, this record is a mish-mash of random noises and instrumental patches sown together in a moderately confusing way, resulting in a work that is above all patchy and monolithic with certain hypnotic qualities, mechanical and lacking a clear direction, especially in comparison to the album coming before it. As the band approach a more ambient domain of sound, the listener gets the least electronic and most abstract work of the group's earliest proceedings.

Ralf, Florian and Conny Plank are once again responsible for the creation of this work, this time lacking a drummer as nobody would be interested in providing a rhythm section to the random swirls of musique concrète, quite ubiquitous on 'Kraftwerk 2', an album that bolsters various effects, tapes and tape echo, molding a palette of unusual sounds from their guitar, flute and violin recordings. 17-minute opener 'Klingklang' is indeed a great peace that goes through different shapes but ultimately ends up being enjoyable enough to be understood, while 'Atem' is simply constructed from recordings of breathing. It is the four tracks on side two that dare to go into a more exploratory direction, and the overall impression is of a poorly conceived bulk of sounds, with occasional glimpses of intrigue and intelligent stitching. This recording is inferior to the debut album, which is why it has been mostly ignored by the band members and critics alike.

So Kraftwerk's prog credentials definitely extend to their earliest period, when the band composed of Ralf Hütter, Florian Schneider-Esleben, and producer Conny Plank was experimenting with sounds, structures and effects, resulting in them releasing some of the earliest and most important krautrock albums, preceded only by Can's 'Monster Movie' and Amon Düül II's 'Phallus Dei'. Kraftwerk's 1970 self-title debut album was released in November through Philips Records, and has remained one of the unusual entries of the German electronic mavericks' discography, completely unrelated to their later works and featuring for the most part a very repetitive, drone-like, and experimental sound, with a lot of jamming, memorable grooves, and free form circular washes of noise, all elements of the respective movement as the band had gradually become a part of the local art scene.

Opening up the album is the iconic piece 'Ruckzuck', a template krautrock compositions that has gone on to become one of the more recognizable early recordings of the band, the patterns of snare-heavy drums and punctuating flutes (played by Florian) provide for a fine patchwork of sounds that could occasionally be seen as an anticipation of the techno genre, with its repetitive textures and cold atmosphere. Second track 'Stratovarius' is wild and effective, opening up with a gloomy organ sequence followed by a collage of effects and dissonant sounds. As the drums kick in, the composition takes on a more recognizable form, until it dissolves into a frantic conundrum of sounds and shrieks of wah-wah guitars. We then have a piece with more ambient qualities - 'Megaherz', an interesting piece could be seen as Kraftwerk's "sound design" experiment. The fourth and final track on the album is the most improvisational of them all, a chaotic and disorienting piece that is difficult to appreciate, while containing some fascinating sounds. Of course, this album is far from perfect, as it is sonically challenging and experimental, which is why it is a fascinating piece of music, but it remains a great krautrock album that places Kraftwerk among the earliest and most significant bands of the movement.

3.5 stars. KRAFTWERK began life as the duo of Hutter and Schneider, they had met in Art school and both had a fondness for improvised avant music. But they started out by calling themselves ORGANISATION and releasing one album before changing their name to KRAFTWERK, but continuing in that experimental Krautrock style of ORGANISATION. In fact the first three KRAFTWERK albums along with that ORGANISATION record are my favourites from them by far. "Autobahn" is where I got off the KRAFTWERK bus.

But for many including the band, this is where they are just getting started. Soon electronics and drum machines will rule their world. Not mine. And that swing in opinions is on full display with the reviews and rating here on this site. That electronic/pop sound that would make them some cash is front and centre on that 22 1/2 minute self-titled opener. Follow the money boys. And they did. Sadly.

"Autobahn" was released late in 1974 and is very much a transitional album as those Krautrock sounds have all but vanished. We still get some organic sounds here which would be completely gone by their next record. And they have expanded to a four piece for the first time here from a duo. My first taste of this album came when my Krautrock loving brother-in-law lent me this cd. My first impressions weren't good, but I only played it a couple of times. My favourite listen of that long title track was my first listen. A novelty I suppose that first time, but then it just sounded lame after that.

I feel pretty much the same about "Kometenmelodie 2" just not my thing by a long shot. My favourite track is easily "Mitternacht" for some actual depth to the sound contrasted with spacey ones. And check out the disturbing violin. Love it! I do like that cover art but I'm just such a big krautrock fan, while Electronic music is much more hit and miss. This one I can take it or leave it so I can't go 4 stars, it doesn't have that value to me. I'll stick with their earlier music.

Still far from their classic sound, the duo of Ralph Hütter and Florian Schneider better known as KRAFTWERK followed the debut album with a similar collection of freeform experimental track pieces that featured traditional instruments like the guitar, bass, drums, organ, flute and violin only manipulated and processed in the production department which was graced by Krautrock wizard Conny Plank. Utterly unique and in many ways very different from the debut, KRAFTWERK 2 insinuates a similarity with its identical cover art only appearing with a green traffic cone instead of a red one. Both albums feature highly experimental instrumentals with an emphasis on the Krautrock kosmische escapist techniques of the early 70s style that was sweeping Germany during the day. KRAFTWERK 2 is a much mellower affair with less crazy tempos and freak outs making this album is bit more surreal with Stockhausen pointillistic and abstract elements that include musique concrète, ambient and of course avant-garde weirdness.

Starting the album with "Klingklang," the track title that would find a more eternal namesake for Ralph & Florian's studio than an experimental musical piece on a long out of print album, this unique track that spans across nearly 18 minutes of the album's near 43 minute run is actually a series of musical motifs that are basically stitched together into an epic stream of consciousness. Starting out with clanging chimes and resonating metallic objects the track abruptly erupts into the classic early motorik style, the same rhythmic groove that drummer Klaus Dinger would adopt as his own and build a whole career out of with Neu! but why the hell not since KRAFTWERK basically abandoned it as well as every artistic statement developed on the first two albums only to diss them as real KRAFTWERK albums. Of course this plan that has backfired as more interest has been generated from their estranged nature from the overall KRAFTWERK canon than probably would have developed organically. Thank you, internet!

As the title track morphs into myriad variations which finds the initial motorik style incrementally upping the tempo and BPM with ever more feisty percussion and flute frenzies, the stream of sound finally melts down around the 11-minute mark and becomes more abstract and kosmische with a steady clanking and a trippy repetitive organ run and some sort of oscillating effect. It doesn't stop there though and then turns turbulent but employs some of the motorik rhythms only in crazy time signatures and accompanied by freaky guitar techniques and experimental tape manipulations, dubs and distortion. Each track after is completely different and much less varied with the second "Atem" which means "Breath" featuring heavy breathing for nearly three minutes followed by "Strom" which creates weird distortion and feedback fuzz on a guitar before morphing into a slow brooding Krautish sort of early post-rock. "Coil 4" offers five minutes plus of minimalism that barely evokes any kind of musicality at all. It's basically a warped warbling and unsettling series of soundscapes that take the freeform liberties of the album to the most extreme.

"Wellenlange" (Wavelength) basically continues the abstract aimlessness but in the middle of the nearly 10-minute track finds a bass line shining a ray of musical sunlight into the freeform chaos that the track begins as. The sounds slowly coalesce like clumps of metal shards attracted to a magnet until the piece sounds more like a freaky piece of music rather than random sounds free floating like dust. The bass eventually incorporates the motorik style of playing. The track is said to sound like some of Brian Eno's most out there experiments. The closing "Harmonika" just sounds like some sort of really intoxicated musicians picking up some accordion to hear what comes out. The results are not much. It sounds like some drunk picking up an accordion and making gibberish noise although it's still obvious that he's still trying to play something! A bizarre way to end the album but it seems that KRAFTWERK 2 really went for the avant-garde jugular in a way that the first album didn't even manage to and that is one wild of an album!

Although disowned by the band along with the two other albums that bookend it, KRAFTWERK 2 is nevertheless a fascinating early Krautrock album of unrelenting experimentation in the vein of early Cluster, Faust and Zweistein which on one hand seems pointless, completely detached from reality and utterly abstract for the sake of being as such however for those who love to engross themselves in these wild concepts and capture the experimental zeitgeist that was permeating the German music scene at the time, then this is really a captivating album for those who can appreciate the vast emptiness and sparse soundscapes of Stockhausen, Ligeti, Varèse, Cage and other classical avant-gardeners of the 20th century classical scene. Similar in approach only in the context of more modern production manipulations (meaning Conny Plank is really a silent third member here). KRAFTWERK 2 is definitely more suited to extreme audiophiles but careful listens will reveal aspects of the band's future emerging at this point as the classic KRAFTWERK sounds were gestating in between the cracks of the wild unhinged experiments. The most forgotten KRAFTWERK album of all is this second one that some of us freaks really love!

One of the most successful early innovators of Germany's electronic music scene, KRAFTWERK went on to international success with its unique adaptations of the world of progressive electronic sounds to the ear wormy realms of catchy pop music. Self-described as robot-pop, this pioneering force led and founded by the duo Ralf Hütter and Florian Scheider has become legendary for its string of crafty synthpop based electronica that found them at the top of the world from 1974 to 1981. While the band's first taste of success began with the 1974 album "Autobahn," KRAFTWERK's origins go back a bit further originating in the world of Krautrock with the short-lived act Organisation which released a sole album titled "Tone Float" in 1970. Existing from only 1969-70, Organisation was amongst the first on the fledgling scene of Germany's unique brand of trippy psychedelic rock called Krautrock which deemphasized the catchy pop and blues aspects in favor of more lysergic freeform excursions into bizarre soundscapes as well as taking the acid rock ethos of the 60s and infusing it with a more progressively complex style of rock music.

While these early albums have been virtually abandoned by the band in the modern day, before KRAFTWERK became an international sensation, these guys released three earlier albums that were unlike the ones that came after. These three albums basically picked up the torch from the experimental rock techniques laid down in Organisation and unfolded them even further. During this four year period between the band's formation in 1970 and the international breakthrough in 74, KRAFTWERK was essentially Hütter and Schneider exploring bizarre musical improvisations that delivered the classic Krautish kosmische effect in which the early years of Krautrock were so heavily steeped. Throughout this era the duo worked with a rotating lineup of several musicians that included guitarist Michael Rother and drummer Klaus Dinger who both quit the band to form Neu!, another pioneer of electronic music development from the Düsseldorf scene. The first album to emerge from this period was the 1970 self-titled release which emerged only three months after "Tone Float" appeared. This debut found Conny Plank tagging along after his work with Organisation to provide all the extra touches which propelled the album into a higher realm of quality control that the duo itself was not ready to tackle.

The greatest revelation about this debut release from KRAFTWERK is in how utterly innovative this album was for so many who passed through as guest musicians. As one of the pioneering Krautrock acts, album #1 was fairly advanced for 1970 with many bands still tangibly connected to the heavy psych 60s. A totally guitar-free affair, Schneider handled the flute, violin and electric percussion while Hütter on the other hand delivered some of the most outlandish synthesizer and organ performances of the early Kraut years. Only two guests appeared on this debut: drummer Andreas Hohman on the first two tracks and future Neu! drummer Klaus Dinger on the grand finale. Augmented by the production prowess of Conny Plank, this self-titled debut excelled at taking the listener to the most tripped out lysergic soundscapes that had yet evolved in the nascent world of Krautrock. The album roughly falls into two distinct categories. The first offered hints of the future world of KRAFTWERK on the opening track "Ruckzuck" as well as some final moments of the closing "Vom Himmel Hoch." That style alternated with the highly improvised space freakery of the middle section that swallows up the lion's share of playing time.

It seems that it wasn't Neu! at all that first developed the distinct motorik style that would make that act famous. It instead appears that the first track on this album "Ruckzuck" displayed the fledgling motorik style that drummer Klaus Dinger would adopt and make a career out of with future Kraftwerk member and second half of Neu!, Michael Rother. This track is an odd mix of that motorik rhythmic drive as presented on the opening track of Neu!'s debut release only hybridized with the world of kosmische psychedelic freakery with trippy flute runs and off-kilter progressive rock time signature deviations. Add the fuzzy psychedelic organ accompaniments and the spaced out electronic embellishments and you've entered Krautrock paradise however rhythmically speaking this is the style Neu! picked up and ran away with.

The second track "Stratovarius" contrasts greatly and rather offers an escapist's paradise into strange psychotropic soundscapes that showcase exotic uses of the organ and synthesizers and a freeform floating effect that ultimately breaks into a percussion sequence offering a steady rock drumbeat that also offers a bit of the motorik style similar to what the opening track is primarily based on. This track though morphs in and out of rock territory and improvisational freakery complete with a serious freakout of an ending that culminates into a haunting processed violin performance. "Megaherz" follows with a "Saucerful Of Secrets" pilgrimage to planet lysergia via rumbling atmospheric keyboards while free floating through a turbulent storm and maniacal organ thrashing before calmly drifting aimlessly for a few moments. This lengthy unaccompanied organ run is probably the weakest part of the album but eventually a flute joins in and the track ebbs and flows with outbursts of electronic freakery. The closing "Vom Himmel Hoch" slowly oozes into electronic existence and pulsates in and out while incrementally accruing electronic overdubs. For much of the track is sort of sounds like an airplane flying towards followed by a detonated bomb explosion and then repeating but ultimately ends in a percussive frenzy that returns to the motorik rhythms while the organ and synths go bat[&*!#] crazy.

For anyone expecting anything remotely similar to the works from "Autobahn" on, this will come as a major shock. This earliest KRAFTWERK release is about as out there as you can get for freeform psychedelic mind[%*!#]ery. This can definitely be described as extremely avant-garde, exceedingly experimental and very much detached difficult listening music far removed from anything remotely resembling commercially viable music in the mainstream. This on the other hand is musical freedom in its most unadulterated form. Ralph and Florian had a knack for crafting bizarre sonic soundscapes that alternated with percussive-heavy outbursts of the motorik side of the Krautrock universe and if you're open minded and receptive to some of the farthest out there musical trips possible then you might actually enjoy this. Personally i adore this earliest KRAFTWERK oddity as it exhibits a monstrous gleeful disregard for all musical these non-conventionalities and which deliver a wild ride through a never-ending series of bizarre soundscapes which offer the occasional respite through a more rhythmic delivery system. Sure Ralph and Florian have utterly written off their first three albums of KRAFTWERK but i'm a fan of both sides of the fence. This album scratches that extreme avant-garde itch whereas the later synthpop robot vocoder albums satisfy me on a totally different level. Either way, KRAFTWERK was one of the true musical innovators from the very beginning.

I wasn't very interested in this album at the time. I had loved Mensch Maschine and Computerwelt; not only were these pioneer works, they were also full of fun and pleasant melodies. Electric Cafe was far more rhythm oriented and had much less on offer when it comes to the latter two qualities. It was at the time also criticised for coming too late in the sense that a new generation of Kraftwerk influenced bands had developed the approach and here it was rather Kraftwerk trying to sound like them than the other way round.

Relistening, I'd say that the last objection is to some extent not justified as Electric Cafe is pretty much its own thing. I mean, I don't know everyone who did Technopop in the eighties, and I do see the similarities to some material that had been recorded in the previous years, so it's not entirely unfounded, but I do believe that nothing else sounds quite like this. The album is more self-referential, it comments on the development of technopop as much as creating it, and the specific use of repetition, revisit, redevelopment and sometimes also the glaring lack of it is really very Kraftwerk. There is also some emptiness and reliance on rhythmic patterns only here that goes further, or rather let's say is based more obviously on leaving things out than other work of this kind. Needless to say that also in the Kraftwerk discograpy this is very unique as it extends their typical minimalism even further to melodic elements and refraining from "filling the space" (except Telephon Anruf and Sex Objekt, which really take a lot from New Order and others). Also I can now more appreciate the fun factor that is still there (Boing Boom Tschak and Telephon Anruf in particular).

At the end of the day you may enjoy Kraftwerk's 1986 version of techno or not, and I can well see why many prog listeners would not like it. Personally I'm not the biggest fan of it either, however I'd say it ultimately works for what it is, and I disagree with those who say it isn't original (it isn't groundbreaking by any means, but it has its uniqueness for sure). I don't disagree quite that much with those who say there aren't many ideas on this album. It's minimalist and to some extent that's the point, but I wouldn't have complained about some more substance. 3 stars.

KRAFTWERK or the vintage regressive return of electronic music of yesteryear! 1.Geigerzahler for the meter here you had to dare and this vocoder is a precursor of Daft Punk, an appetizer which highlights the computers 2. Radio-activity for the most avant-garde title there is in the middle of the 70s, in fact the most beautiful intro there is; afterward it's rather poorly aged even though it still remains in my musical heart as a reference 3. Radioland for the encore tinkering of the previous title, slowed tempo, monolithic, archaic tune, 4. Airwaves which follows, most 2 pieces linked together; notes recalling some of VANGELIS then those of the future JM JARRE, were they in the same studio? the voice is to be taken as an instrument more than anything else, imprinting some sort of refrain, a framework for the monolithic piece, where the most is to be put on the incursions of the buttons to turn for a spatial rendering 5. Sendpause with this white noise setting, yellow, seals the end of side A

6. Deaf vocal news on a primary piano, new basic flight 7. Die Stimme der Energie continues with the voice of a robot, a computer, what can it speak? 8. Antenna for the radio edit side B which takes the brushes on an atonal redundant sound 9. Radio Sterne continues to explore Bontempi 3-key sounds; avant-garde; but it really is simplistic and lacking in soul, repetitive and borderline annoying; precursor of disco groups, later trance 10.Uran follows with the particularity of eyeing the first TANGERINE DREAM even more on the POPOL VUH of old times 11. Transistor follows... yes a touch of Mike OLDFIELD sounds now, but much more basic, monolithic 12. Ohm Sweet Ohm for the finale with a Bontempi again refrain.... you had to dare to do it there, yes the sound has aged atrociously and we will remember the flagship title exclusively.(3 for the album, 5 for the title)

Review #113!

'Autobahn' is a great progressive electronic album. It is quite different from the work of Klaus Schulze (as well as Tangerine Dream) and his ambient compositions revolving around droning synths. This is almost poppy with comforting, not very complicated keyboard beats. At least most of it isn't complicated. The album starts with the epic title track. The first seven minutes of this song are relatively normal, with some nice vocals and lyrics coming in and out of the scene. Then this semi-ambient Can-esque stuff comes on that just sounds wonderful. This ambient section changes in melody slightly, but throughout the entire part is just captivating and great. Thirteen minutes in the original melody comes in. For the rest of the song there are more rapid changes made to the melody. This is a perfect example of peak progressive electronic music. Electronic based and, well, progressive. On the second side is 'Kometenmelodie 1', a seven-minute ambient piece. This is supreme ambience. Keyboards dubbed on keyboards dubbed on a little more keyboards. Kraftwerk manages to bring some very interesting sounds to the table. Amazing, impressive, beautiful, perfect. 'Kometenmelodie 2' continues this wonderful ambient sequence with a more upbeat mood. This track makes me feel so happy, like when I listen to simple '80s bands like Erasure and OMD(the latter actually surprisingly experimental). Wonderful. 'Mitternacht' is yet another ambient piece which is probably the most complex on the album. I'm not sure if this was all done with synths, but if so, it is just as impressive as it would be if it wasn't. Echoey, confusing horn-noises, interesting percussion sounds and more. 'Morgenspaziergang' sounds similar to 'Mitternacht' but has more diverse, organic sounds. Almost medieval. Anyways, this is a superb electronic album from a pioneer of the genre. Full of great songs destined to give you joy. Maybe perfect. Prog on.

If we are talking about artists from the 70s era of German experimental music, while Faust and Can advanced rock music forward, none were more influential in the realm of electronic music as Kraftwerk was. You could argue that mantle goes towards Tangerine Dream, and that is true that they did influence a great deal of artistic electronic music that was certainly very spacey and ambient, but none were influential to many artists in the future that'd inspire a ton of genres from trip-hop to French electronic dance music, to even the broad strokes of synthpop than Kraftwerk. Started as a krautrock and drone band, and after their successful album of Autobahn, they quickly became their own with their unique brand of electronic music that combined the eccentric pop of the time with the broad progressive strokes the underground German scene had at the time. It created a unique and highly influential musical landscape for the band to explore. It was robotic, but not soulless. I will say they are not my favorite band that came out of the German experimental music scene, but I do have the highest respect for them, even more so after I heard this album. Before getting into this album I expected my usual Kraftwerk affairs, similar to the stuff that I'd heard from Autobahn or the album they'd release after this one, Computerwelt. It was none of those, but possibly prototypical versions of genres that hadn't existed yet.

Die Mensch-Maschine is a fairly short album but has a lot to unpack. Die Roboter is the first song on the record, and with it, we get a mix of electronic music with disco strangely enough. If you couldn't already tell by the sounds of this song, then I suggest you listen to Daft Punk for a bit, since this song is pretty much the future of euro step music. Incredibly bouncy synths, robotic voices, electro steps, and a whole wide range of unique additional flairs make this a clear shot example of being ahead of the curve. I have no idea what the German experimental scene was on, but it almost was like they could see into the future with the songs they created. The robotic personas Kraftwerk would utilize are fun and unique for the time, and they had some fun portraying themselves as machines less than flesh. While that may sound quite saddening, it was what made them drive their music forward. This is their national anthem, a robotic, distant, cold, calculated, yet still so rich in energy song that is incredibly fun to listen to.

Kraftwerk was also big into the themes of space, as evident with Spacelab. A lot of celestial keyboard works bounce around through many vibrant melodies and sounds that wrap the listener around in a cool and collected state of mind. The rhythm laid down here sets the mood for the entire song, being this cool and collected piece of music that might have some more up its sleeve. Ethereal, bright, and brimming with excellency. A classic Kraftwerk song.

Metropolis is another example of what a classic Kraftwerk song sounds like. Deep in the synthpop on this one, we get even more vibrant electronic dance music that is uniquely inspirational. In a modern context, I get a lot of vibes from French electronic musicians like Daft Punk and Étienne de Crécy, however more laid back as the music expresses itself with only one word repeated through the song: "Metropolis". This is a metropolis of sound and styles that salivates every aspect of its core and shows off the humanity Kraftwerk has deep within its robotic shells. Kraftwerk for me has always been a band that features an optimistic tint to their glasses with their more industrial style of music, and it's an aspect of the band that I think works for them in spades. Metropolis is an example of such. It's fun, and built from the ground up to be fun, but without it being borderline commercial. It is a form of music that I slowly but surely love with each passing moment.

That isn't even the best part. All those songs are great but none compare to my favorite song off this record, Das Model. What can I say about this song? Well for starters it is incredibly unique for its time. I have an itch that this song is what inspired most of the sounds from the 90s era of video games, specifically with the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo. I wouldn't be surprised since they were inspirational to one of the bigger known Japanese synthpop groups, Yellow Magic Orchestra, who also had an equally odd robotic feel to their personas. I also dig how tongue and cheek the lyrics are. It's very much trying to take a stab at how companies commercialize people's talents for profit, slowly burning up the people they're exploiting. Kraftwerk seems like a resilient enough band for them to not overheat since they're still around today, but even then with their popularity it definitely must've been hard to cool down. It is a song filled with vibrancy and uniqueness but tells a story that anyone no matter what field they are in could relate to.

Afterward, we get the longest song off the album, an 8-9 minute tune called Neonlicht. This is the only song off the album I have issues with, and it's the length surprisingly enough. The first half of the song is a beautiful, almost pre- Vaporwave style of music with beautiful singing and a crisp sound to boot. Afterward is where the song started to become an issue for me. They start to repeat this melody over and over again for 5-6 minutes, and it gets rather annoying. Nothing new happens in that repetition of patterns, and what once felt like a beautiful song about the lights in the city, soon became a repetitive hazard. I think they should've ended the song at 3:10. It'd make the album even shorter, and it'd make the song short, but it'd make the album a possible masterpiece for me. The first half is great and stellar, but the second half could've been something more.

The album does end on a high note with the title track, Die Mensch-Maschine. You hear that melody right? That right there is what you'll hear in quite a bit of rap songs nowadays, and can you blame the artists that use this little harmony? It is immaculate and strange, yet so right with the mood of the song. It'd be more bizarre to NOT try and use that for an equally influential genre of music such as hip-hop and trip-hop. This is what I love about the German experimental scene. Acts like Kraftwerk, Faust, Can, and so many others have inspired so many artists and genres that even the most basic melody can inspire millions to try their hands on the wheel, resulting in some of the biggest genres in the world. We gotta thank Kraftwerk for that, that's for certain.

I am surprised that this became one of my favorite Kraftwerk records, but how could you not love it? While imperfect due to Neonlicht, all the rest of the songs here are stellar in conveying moods, themes, and beauty in an otherwise robotic shell. I do not doubt in my mind that Kraftwerk is one of the most influential artists to come out of the 70s German scene. Their music inspired so much for decades upon decades that their influence can still be seen today. What a revolutionary work of art.

Review Nº 548

Kraftwerk's influence in the "modern" music is so huge that it's rather difficult to pinpoint all its real dimensions. The group is responsible for popularizing the electronic music and is always remembered when we are talking about the origins of techno, electro, dance music and also of funk. However, being Kraftwerk one of the most important, revolutionary and influential groups in the history of the "modern" music, it's curiously one of the most unknown too. Kraftwerk survived to see the rhythmic patterns developed in the studio serving as the basis for electronics. Even so, their story remains shrouded in some mystery, largely because of their members are averse to any type of advertising.

Kraftwerk was founded in 1970 by Florian Schneider-Esleben (flute) and Ralf Hutter (keyboards) in Dusseldorf, Germany. They met when they studied at the Dusseldorf Conservatory in the late 60's, participating in the experimental music scene of the time, the movement later called Krautrock. The band had other members in their line up all over the years. In 2009, Schneider announced his departure from the band. So, only Hutter remained from the original line up.

The origin of the name Kraftwerk (Power Plant, Electrical Complex) comes from the place where the group's tests and experiments were carried out, a Refinery (Complex) in Dusseldorf. It's in this industrial ambient with the mechanical rumination of factories in the background that Kraftwerk records their first works, "Kraftwerk" in 1970, "Kraftwerk 2" in 1971 and "Ralf & Florian" in 1973, merging noise, sound, poetry and industrial folklore. The progression of the group's sound came gradually assimilated to technology and its elements. This dedication mixed with "genius" gave rise to the masterpiece "Autobahn" in 1974. With "Autobahn", Kraftwerk was able to create the glacial beauty of the cyber music.

"Autobahn" is an album with five tracks. The 22 minute of the title track became a big hit when it was released in edited form as a single, and that was quite an achievement for a song with German vocals. It begins with the slamming of a car door and the throaty whirr of an engine ignition, intro this iconic track, which takes up all the side one of the album. The track evokes the feeling of driving on the Autobahn, from journeying through the landscape, in the high-speed concentration of the fast lane, to tuning the car radio and the monotony of a long trip. It describes the A 555 from Cologne to Bonn, the first Autobahn. The track featured some of Kraftwerk's finest themes, built around sequenced electronic rhythm patterns. Schneider's atmospheric flute gives some passages an almost otherworldly feel, but he would unfortunately stop using it after this album. The band also used the electronic equipment to imitate the sounds of speeding cars along the Autobahn, and this experimentation was taken even further on the completely instrumental second side of the album. The 12 minute of the two-part "Kometenmelodie" feature lots of spacey sounds that illustrated flying comets, especially on the first part. Both parts were inspired by the Kohoutek comet, which passed close to Earth in 1973. "Kometenmelodie 1" is a ponderous, yet entrancing, piece of space-inspired electronica which serves as a preface to "Kometenmelodie 2". The theme from the first part had evolved completely in the second part, and should be counted as yet another classic Kraftwerk's theme. In contrast to "Kometenmelodie 1", "Kometenmelodie 2" embraces a structure and melody more akin to the title track of the album. "Kometenmelodie 2" was released both as a B side to the "Autobahn" single and as an A side follow up single in its own right. The gloomy and sinister "Mitternacht" lives up to its name, which means "Midnight". The sombre feel of this track seems at odds with the prevailing mood of the album, but lends to it a true ominous beauty. The rural "Morgenspaziergang" featured lots of electronic imitations of birds and running water, with a simple and repetitive melody played on flute. It's one of the most natural songs the band ever made. It belies their reputation for producing pure electronica. It also showcases the diversity of the album, delineating the track from the rest and ending the album on a true high point. The ending reintroduces a musical motif first heard in the instrumental section of "Autobahn". It's a potent end to a peerless album.

Conclusion: In 1974, Kraftwerk created an electronic epic. Five decades on, "Autobahn" is hailed as a masterpiece. At the heart of Kraftwerk was the relationship between humans and technology, were the synths dominated the sound, which was sparse, linear and rhythmic, but beneath the machine like ethos breathed elegant and enticing melody. On this album, Kraftwerk created a sound that was transformative and unique, a hypnotic and insistent electronic pulse populated by shimmering electronic keyboards, rhythm loops and trance like guitars. "Autobahn" is an album that saw man and machine working in perfect harmony. It was a pivotal step forward for contemporary music. It's a timeless and profound piece of work that still remains relevant, even today. It's an almost mystical reverence for the ordinary objects of an industrial world. "Autobahn" remains one of the best and most memorable electronic prog albums of the 70's.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)