Electronic Music Entry

Kraftwerk is a band from Germany that played and tremendously popularized electronic music. The primary leaders and songwriters of Kraftwerk consisted of Ralf Hutter and Florian Schneider. Other members that joined/contributed to the band include Karl Bartos, Wolfgang Flur, and a few others that rehearsed and acted as studio musicians. Kraftwerk was very experimental with the electronic music they produced that included electronic instrumentation, very catchy melodies, classical styles of harmony, simplistic lyrics, repetitive rhythms, synthesizers, and the use of vocoders for vocals. The image of Kraftwerk was very robotic. The band members wore suits or matching shirt and ties for their album pictures and when they performed live shows.

The albums put out by Kraftwerk between 1974 and 1981 were extremely revolutionary and influential for electronic music and contained conceptual themes. These albums consisted of Autobahn, Radio-Activity, Trans-Europe Express, The Man-Machine, and Computer World. Road travel was the conceptual theme for the album Autobahn, and was inspired by American pop group The Beach Boys. Kraftwerk involved nuclear energy and the radio as their theme for the album Radio-Activity and used European connectivity/train travel as the theme for Trans-Europe Express. The rhythm and beat of the Trans-Europe Express track was created to emulate the sound of a train.

Overall, Kraftwerk has had a huge impact on electronic music and has influenced many artists/bands over the years. One characteristic of Kraftwerk that earned them the position of the biggest influence of electronic music was their overall performance, use of instrumentation, and album/lyrical themes. The band utilized themes for most of their albums about everyday life, technology, and travel that was present during the time they released each album. Their instrumentation was very electronic based and they used electronic drums and synthesizers for songs and performances. A lot of their albums were released in different versions for other languages then German. Another characteristic that put Kraftwerk at the top of electronic music is how much influence the band has had on other artists/bands and various genres of music. From David Bowie to Afrika Bambaataa, there are many similarities of the musical style of Kraftwerk that are found in other artist’s music.

As a listener and industry professional, Kraftwerk is a very influential band. Their style of music is very catchy and represents their own style of music. I am very impressed with the albums and themes that are portrayed by Kraftwerk. I like how there experiments with music led to massive success and how inspiring they were for other artists. I am a fan of Kraftwerk and personally like the albums Autobahn, Trans-Europe Express, and Computer World.