Krautrock is a generic name for the experimental bands who
appeared in Germany in the early 1970s. It was originally a somewhat
derogatory term coined by the British music press from the slang term
"Kraut", meaning "a German person" and taken from the
traditional German dish of pickled cabbage, Sauerkraut. However, because
much of the music produced by these bands has since come to be very highly
regarded, the term "krautrock" is now generally seen as an
accolade rather than an insult.
Typical bands dubbed "krautrock" in the early 1970s included
Tangerine Dream, Faust, Can, and others associated with the celebrated
Cologne-based producer and engineer Conny Plank, such as Neu!, Kraftwerk and
Cluster. Bands such as these were reacting against the post-WWII cultural
vacuum in Germany and tending to reject Anglo-American popular culture in
favour of creating their own more radical and experimental new German
culture.
Mostly instrumental, the signature sound of krautrock mixed rock music
and "rock band" instrumentation (guitar, bass, drums) with
electronic instrumentation and textures, often with what would now be
described as an ambient music sensibility.
By the end of the 1960s, the American and British counterculture and
hippie movement had moved rock towards psychedelia, heavy metal, progressive
rock and other styles, incorporating, for the first time in popular music,
socially and politically incisive lyrics. The 1968 German student movement,
French protests and Italian student movement had created a class of young,
intellectual continental listeners, while nuclear weapons, pollution and war
inspired protests and activism. Music had taken a turn towards electronic
avant-garde in the mid-1950s.
These factors all laid the scene for the explosion in what came to be
termed krautrock, which arose at the first major German rock festival
in 1968 at Essen. Like their American and British counterparts, German rock
musicians played a kind of psychedelia. In contrast, however, there was no
attempt to reproduce the effects of drugs, but rather an innovative fusion
of psychedelia and the electronic avant-garde. That same year, 1968, saw the
foundation of the Zodiak Free Arts Lab in Berlin by Hans-Joachim Roedelius,
Klaus Schulze and Conrad Schnitzler, which further popularized the
psychedelic-rock sound in the German mainstream.
Originally Krautrock was a form of Free art which meant you could get
Krautrock bands' records for free at Free Art Fairs.
The next few years saw a wave of pioneering groups. In 1969, Can formed,
adding jazz to the mix, while the following year saw Kluster (later Cluster)
begin recording keyboard-based instrumental music with an emphasis on static
drones. In 1971, the bands Tangerine Dream and Faust used electronic
synthesizers and advanced production techniques to make what they called kosmische
musik.
In 1972, two albums incorporated European rock and electronic psychedelia
with Asian sounds: Popol Vuh's In Den Gaerten Pharaos and Deuter's Aum.
Meanwhile, kosmische musik saw the release of two double albums, Klaus
Schulze's Cyborg and Tangerine Dream's Zeit, while a band
called Neu! began to play highly rhythmic music. By the middle of the
decade, one of the most well-known German bands, Kraftwerk, had released
albums like Autobahn and Radio-Activity, which laid the
foundation for electro, techno and other styles later in the century.
By the late 1990s and early 2000s, with the resurgence of electronic
music and a new generation rediscovering much of the early work of German
music in that period, Krautrock came to be considered a style in and of
itself. Artists such as Stereolab, Laika, Boredoms, Mouse on Mars, and
Tortoise working under the post-rock and electronica rubrics have often
cited bands in the Krautrock canon as being among their more significant
influences.
Notable Artists;
Amon Düül I
Amon Düül II
Ash Ra Tempel
Birth Control
Can
Cluster
Eloy
Faust
Guru Guru
Harmonia
Jane
Kraftwerk
La Dusseldorf
Neu!
Popol Vuh
Klaus Schulze
Tangerine Dream
The Krauts (London 86)
Wallenstein
Witthüser & Westrupp
