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131-527: Krautrock (also called kosmische Musik , German for "cosmic music" ) is a broad genre of experimental rock that developed in West Germany in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It originated among artists who blended elements of psychedelic rock , avant-garde composition, and electronic music , among other eclectic sources. Common elements included hypnotic rhythms, extended improvisation , musique concrète techniques, and early synthesizers , while

262-456: A "genuine sense of awe and wonder." We were trying to put aside everything we had heard in rock 'n' roll, the three-chord pattern, the lyrics. We had the urge of saying something completely different. —Jean-Hervé Peron of Faust . Core influences on these German artists included avant-garde composers Karlheinz Stockhausen and Terry Riley , and bands such as the Mothers of Invention ,

393-629: A 236-page hardback book. The album was nominated for the Grammy Awards for Best Dance/Electronic Album and Best Surround Sound Album at the ceremony that took place on 28 January 2018, winning the former, which became the band's first Grammy win. On 20 July 2018, at a concert in Stuttgart, German astronaut Alexander Gerst performed "Spacelab" with the band while aboard the International Space Station , joining via

524-519: A German electronic band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider . Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music , Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to popularize the genre. The group began as part of West Germany's experimental krautrock scene in the early 1970s before fully embracing electronic instrumentation, including synthesizers, drum machines , and vocoders . Wolfgang Flür joined

655-772: A broader and wider range of music styles. In addition, social identity also plays a large role in music preference. Personality is a key contributor for music selection. Those who consider themselves to be "rebels" will tend to choose heavier music styles like heavy metal or hard rock , while those who consider themselves to be more "relaxed" or "laid back" will tend to choose lighter music styles like jazz or classical music. According to one model, there are five main factors that exist that underlie music preferences that are genre-free, and reflect emotional/affective responses. These five factors are: Studies have shown that while women prefer more treble oriented music, men prefer to listen to bass-heavy music. A preference for bass-heavy music

786-590: A circuit that triggers analog synthetic percussion sounds. The band first performed in public with this device in 1973, on the television program Aspekte (on the all-German channel Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen ), where it was played by Wolfgang Flür. They created drum machines for Autobahn and Trans-Europe Express . On the Radio-Activity tour in 1976 Kraftwerk tested out an experimental light-beam-activated drum cage allowing Flür to trigger electronic percussion through arm and hand movements. Unfortunately,

917-404: A commodity and (4) in capitalist societies, subject to the laws of 'free' enterprise_ it should ideally sell as much as possible. The distinction between classical and popular music has sometimes been blurred in marginal areas such as minimalist music and light classics. Background music for films/movies often draws on both traditions. In this respect, music is like fiction, which likewise draws

1048-449: A complex music instrument, as well as a sound laboratory; Florian Schneider in particular developed a fascination with music technology, with the result that the technical aspects of sound generation and recording gradually became his main fields of activity within the band. Alexei Monroe called Kraftwerk the "first successful artists to incorporate representations of industrial sounds into non-academic electronic music". Kraftwerk used

1179-545: A conference center) was handpicked by Ralf Hütter, for its retro-futuristic UFO-like architecture. Bespoke visuals of the building, with the saucer section descending from space, were displayed during the rendition of Spacelab. In 2014, Kraftwerk brought their four-night, 3D Catalogue tour to the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, and at NYC's United Palace Theatre . They also played at

1310-629: A custom-built vocoder on their albums Ralf und Florian and Autobahn ; the device was constructed by engineers P. Leunig and K. Obermayer of the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt Braunschweig. Hütter and Schneider received a patent for an electronic drum kit with sensor pads, filed in July 1975 and issued in June 1977. It must be hit with metal sticks, which are connected to the device to complete

1441-403: A digital compilation album . It includes remixed tracks taken from singles released 1991, 1999, 2000, 2004 and 2007, plus the previously unreleased "Non Stop", a version of " Musique Non-Stop " used as a jingle by MTV Europe beginning in 1993. The cover re-uses the cover from " Expo Remix ". The compilation was released on CD and vinyl in 2022. On 30 October 2021, Kraftwerk were inducted into

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1572-584: A distinction between literary fiction and popular fiction that is not always precise. Country music, also known as country and western (or simply country) and hillbilly music, is a genre of popular music that originated in the southern United States in the early 1920s. Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments , digital instruments, or circuitry-based music technology in its creation. Contemporary electronic music includes many varieties and ranges from experimental art music to popular forms such as electronic dance music (EDM). Funk

1703-575: A famous appearance at the dance festival Tribal Gathering held in England. In 1998, the group toured the US and Japan for the first time since 1981, along with shows in Brazil and Argentina . Three new songs were performed during this period and a further two tested in soundchecks, which remain unreleased. Following this trek, the group decided to take another break. In July 1999 the single "Tour de France"

1834-444: A half-dozen other musicians during the preparations for and the recording of three albums and sporadic live appearances, including guitarist Michael Rother and drummer Klaus Dinger , who left to form Neu! . The only constant figure in these line-ups was Schneider, whose main instrument at the time was the flute; at times he also played the violin and guitar, all processed through a varied array of electronic devices. Hütter, who left

1965-517: A live video link. Gerst played melodies using a tablet as his instrument alongside Hütter as a duet, and delivered a short message to the audience. On 20 July 2019, Kraftwerk headlined the Saturday night lineup on the Lovell Stage at Bluedot Festival , a music and science festival held annually at Jodrell Bank Observatory , Cheshire, UK. The 2019 festival celebrated the 50th anniversary of

2096-643: A look at those albums. They've always been available, but as really bad bootlegs . Now we have more artwork. Emil has researched extra contemporary drawings, graphics, and photographs to go with each album, collections of paintings that we worked with, and drawings that Florian and I did. We took a lot of Polaroids in those days." Kraftwerk also released an iOS app called Kraftwerk Kling Klang Machine. The Lenbach House in Munich exhibited some Kraftwerk 3-D pieces in Autumn 2011. Kraftwerk performed three concerts to open

2227-541: A major influence. The group was also inspired by the funk music of James Brown and, later, punk rock . They were initially connected to the German krautrock scene. In the mid- 1970s , they transitioned to an electronic sound which they described as "robot pop". Kraftwerk's lyrics dealt with post-war European urban life and technology—traveling by car on the Autobahn , traveling by train, using home computers, and

2358-906: A music collection supposedly used by East German athletes in their training. The music bears excessive inspiration and techniques of the Krautrock genre. Modern bands, such as Osees , King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard and Minami Deutsch have been described as krautrock, or have noted krautrock as influential on their styles. Citations Bibliography Music genre Music can be divided into genres in numerous ways, sometimes broadly and with polarity, such as for popular music , as opposed to art music or folk music ; or, as another example, religious music and secular music . The artistic nature of music means that these classifications are often subjective and controversial, and some genres may overlap. As genres evolve, sometimes new music

2489-537: A new popular culture. Dieter Moebius , of the bands Cluster and Harmonia , noted that "we were a lot of the times on the streets instead of studying. As young people we were not very proud to be German [...] we were all tired of listening to bad German music and imitations of American music. Something had to happen." The movement saw artists merge elements of varied genres such as psychedelic rock , avant-garde forms of electronic music , funk rhythm, jazz improvisation and "ethnic" music styles, typically reflecting

2620-624: A strong sense of alienation existing side by side with a celebration of the joys of modern technology. Starting with the release of Autobahn , Kraftwerk began to release a series of concept albums ( Radio-Activity , Trans-Europe Express , The Man-Machine , Computer World , Tour de France Soundtracks ). All of Kraftwerk's albums from Trans Europe Express onwards, except Tour de France Soundtracks , have been released in separate versions: one with German vocals for sale in Germany, Switzerland and Austria and one with English vocals for

2751-490: A subcategory within major genres or their subgenres. The genealogy of musical genres expresses, often in the form of a written chart. New genres of music can arise through the development of new styles of music; in addition to simply creating a new categorization. Although it is conceivable to create a musical style with no relation to existing genres, new styles usually appear under the influence of pre-existing genres. Musicologists have sometimes classified music according to

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2882-514: A succession of other musical styles and developments. Early contemporary enthusiasts outside Germany included Hawkwind and in particular Dave Brock who supposedly penned the sleeve notes for the British edition of Neu!'s first album. Faust's budget release The Faust Tapes has been cited as a formative teenage influence by several musicians growing up in the early 1970s such as Julian Cope , who has always cited krautrock as an influence, and wrote

3013-549: A surprising appearance at the MTV European Music Awards in Edinburgh , Scotland, performing "Aerodynamik". The same year a promotional box set entitled 12345678 (subtitled The Catalogue ) was issued, with plans for a proper commercial release to follow. The box featured remastered editions of the group's eight core studio albums, from Autobahn to Tour de France Soundtracks . This long-awaited box-set

3144-432: A trichotomous distinction such as Philip Tagg's "axiomatic triangle consisting of 'folk', 'art' and 'popular' musics". He explains that each of these three is distinguishable from the others according to certain criteria. Automatic methods of musical similarity detection, based on data mining and co-occurrence analysis, have been developed to classify music titles for electronic music distribution. Glenn McDonald,

3275-709: A turning point in Kraftwerk's live shows. With financial support from Phonogram Inc. , in the US, they were able to undertake a tour to promote the Autobahn album, a tour which took them to the US, Canada and the UK for the first time. The tour also saw a new, stable, live line-up in the form of a quartet. Hütter and Schneider continued playing keyboard synthesizers such as the Minimoog and ARP Odyssey , with Schneider's use of flute diminishing. The two men started singing live for

3406-524: A world reference since the east–west tensions during the Early Modern Period . Traditional folk music usually refers to songs composed in the twentieth century, which tend to be written as universal truths and big issues of the time they were composed. Artists including Bob Dylan ; Peter, Paul and Mary ; James Taylor ; and Leonard Cohen , transformed folk music to what it is known today. Newer composers such as Ed Sheeran (pop folk) and

3537-455: Is a subordinate within a genre. In music terms, it is a subcategory of a musical genre that adopts its basic characteristics, but also has its own set of characteristics that clearly distinguish and set it apart within the genre. A subgenre is also often being referred to as a style of the genre. The proliferation of popular music in the 20th century has led to over 1,200 definable subgenres of music. A musical composition may be situated in

3668-473: Is a 12-inch album-sized box set containing all eight remastered CDs in cardboard slipcases, as well as LP-sized booklets of photographs and artwork for each individual album. Although not officially confirmed, Ralf Hütter suggested that a second boxed set of their first three experimental albums— Kraftwerk , Kraftwerk 2 and Ralf and Florian —could be on its way, possibly seeing commercial release after their next studio album: "We've just never really taken

3799-600: Is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll " in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom. Heavy metal evolved from hard rock , psychedelic rock , and blues rock in late 1960s and 1970s with notable acts such as Black Sabbath , Judas Priest and Motörhead . The popularity of heavy metal soared in

3930-439: Is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms popular music and pop music are often used interchangeably, although the former describes all music that is popular and includes many disparate styles. The aggressiveness of the musical and performative style, based on structural simplicity and the vigorous rhythms of rock'n'roll style, reinforced

4061-605: Is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic , danceable new form of music through a mixture of soul, jazz, and rhythm and blues (R&B). Hip Hop music, also referred to as hip-hop or rap music , is a genre of music that was started in the United States, specifically the South Bronx in the New York City by African-American youth from

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4192-527: Is also used as a German analogue to the English term " space rock ". The style was often instrumental and characterized by "spacy", ambient soundscapes. Artists used synthesizers such as the EMS VCS 3 and Moog Modular , as well as sound processing effects and tape-based approaches. They often rejected rock music conventions, and instead drew on "serious" electronic compositions. The term "kosmische Musik"

4323-540: Is generally defined similarly by many authors and musicologists, while the related term style has different interpretations and definitions. Some, like Peter van der Merwe , treat the terms genre and style as the same, saying that genre should be defined as pieces of music that share a certain style or "basic musical language". Others, such as Allan F. Moore, state that genre and style are two separate terms, and that secondary characteristics such as subject matter can also differentiate between genres. A subgenre

4454-725: Is lumped into existing categories or else a proliferation of derivative subgenres , fusion genres and "micro genres" starts to accrue. Douglass M. Green distinguishes between genre and form in his book Form in Tonal Music . He lists madrigal , motet , canzona , ricercar , and dance as examples of genres from the Renaissance period. To further clarify the meaning of genre , Green writes about " Beethoven's Op. 61 " and "Mendelssohn's Op. 64 ". He explains that both are identical in genre and are violin concertos that have different forms. However, Mozart's Rondo for Piano, K. 511, and

4585-403: Is orally passed from one generation to another. Usually, the artist is unknown, and there are several versions of the same song. The genre is transmitted by singing, listening and dancing to popular songs. This type of communication allows culture to transmit the styles (pitches and cadences) as well as the context it was developed. Culturally transmitting folk songs maintain rich evidence about

4716-477: Is pivoted around sound recording technologies (for example jazz , pop, rock, rap and so on). These last two branches are created by means of the above-mentioned audiotactile matrix in which the formative medium is the Audiotactile Principle. Art music primarily includes classical traditions, including both contemporary and historical classical music forms. Art music exists in many parts of

4847-490: Is so particularly in the case of western classical music. Art music may include certain forms of jazz , though some feel that jazz is primarily a form of popular music. The 1960s saw a wave of avant-garde experimentation in free jazz, represented by artists such as Ornette Coleman , Sun Ra , Albert Ayler , Archie Shepp and Don Cherry . Additionally, avant-garde rock artists such as Frank Zappa , Captain Beefheart , and

4978-548: Is sometimes paired with borderline and antisocial personalities. Age is another strong factor that contributes to musical preference. Evidence is available that shows that music preference can change as one gets older. A Canadian study showed that adolescents show greater interest in pop music artists while adults and the elderly population prefer classic genres such as rock, opera, and jazz . Kraftwerk Kraftwerk ( German pronunciation: [ˈkʁaftvɛʁk] , lit.   ' power plant ' ) are

5109-568: The Agnus Dei from his Mass, K. 317, are quite different in genre but happen to be similar in form." In 1982, Franco Fabbri proposed a definition of the musical genre that is now considered to be normative: "musical genre is a set of musical events (real or possible) whose course is governed by a definite set of socially accepted rules", where a musical event can be defined as "any type of activity performed around any type of event involving sound". A music genre or subgenre may be defined by

5240-528: The Apollo 11 Moon landing. On 21 April 2020, Florian Schneider died at age 73 after a brief battle with cancer. On 3 July 2020, the German-language versions of Trans Europe Express , The Man Machine , Computer World , Techno Pop and The Mix , alongside 3-D The Catalogue , were released worldwide on streaming services for the first time. On 21 December 2020, Parlophone/WEA released Remixes ,

5371-654: The B-side so the single was repackaged by EMI and re-released with "The Model" as the A-side. The single reached number one in the UK, making "The Model" Kraftwerk's most successful song in that country. As a result, the Man-Machine album also became a success in the UK, peaking at number 9 in the album chart in February 1982. The band's live set focused increasingly on song-based material, with greater use of vocals and

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5502-798: The Balkans with dates in Serbia , Bulgaria , Macedonia , Turkey , and Greece. In December, the Minimum-Maximum DVD was released. During 2006, the band performed at festivals in Norway, Ireland, the Czech Republic, Spain, Belgium, and Germany. In April 2008 the group played three shows in US cities Minneapolis , Milwaukee , and Denver , and were a coheadliner at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival . This

5633-951: The Robert Schumann Hochschule in Düsseldorf in the late 1960s, participating in the German experimental music and art scene of the time, which Melody Maker jokingly dubbed " krautrock ". They joined a quintet known as Organisation , which released one album, Tone Float in 1970, issued on RCA Records in the UK, and split shortly thereafter. Schneider became interested in synthesizers, deciding to acquire one in 1970. While visiting an exhibition in their hometown about visual artists Gilbert and George , they see "two men wearing suits and ties, claiming to bring art into everyday life. The same year, Hütter and Schneider started bringing everyday life into art and form Kraftwerk". Early Kraftwerk line-ups from 1970 to 1974 fluctuated, as Hütter and Schneider worked with around

5764-570: The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame . In November 2021, the band announced plans for a 2022 North American tour. With the members' live performances celebrating Kraftwerk's fiftieth anniversary, the Remixes compilation album came out on compact disc and vinyl for the first time in addition. From 27 May to 10 July 2022, the formation undertook a successful North American tour, performing in 24 cities. Since 2023, they have begun visualising their music on

5895-476: The musical techniques , the cultural context, and the content and spirit of the themes. Geographical origin is sometimes used to identify a music genre, though a single geographical category will often include a wide variety of subgenres. Timothy Laurie argues that, since the early 1980s, "genre has graduated from being a subset of popular music studies to being an almost ubiquitous framework for constituting and evaluating musical research objects". The term genre

6026-520: The "adrenalized insurgency" of Detroit artists of the late '60s MC5 and the Stooges . The input, expertise, and influence of producer and engineer Konrad "Conny" Plank was highly significant in the early years of Kraftwerk. Plank also worked with many of the other leading German electronic acts of that time, including members of Can , Neu! , Cluster , and Harmonia . As a result of his work with Kraftwerk, Plank's studio near Cologne became one of

6157-619: The $ 20 ticket price for tickets at New York's MoMA in 2012, which caused consternation. Even so, the demand for the tickets at The Tate was so high that it shut down the website. In March 2013, the band was not allowed to perform at a music festival in China due to unspecified "political reasons". In an interview in June after performing the eight albums of The Catalogue in Sydney, Ralf Hütter stated: "Now we have finished one to eight, now we can concentrate on number nine." In July, they performed at

6288-486: The 1960s and early 1970s. The music was partially inspired by broad cultural developments such as the revolutionary 1968 German student movement , with many young people having both political and aesthetic concerns. Youth rebelled against both dominant American influence and conservative German entertainment such as schlager music , seeking to liberate themselves from Germany's Nazi legacy in World War II and create

6419-508: The 1975 Autobahn tour, Kraftwerk began work on a follow-up album, Radio-Activity (German title: Radio-Aktivität ). After further investment in new equipment, the Kling Klang Studio became a fully working recording studio. The group used the central theme in radio communication, which had become enhanced on their last tour of the United States. With Emil Schult working on artwork and lyrics, Kraftwerk began to compose music for

6550-454: The 1980s with bands such as Iron Maiden , Metallica and Guns 'n' Roses . It has a rougher style and heavier sound than other forms of rock music, with notable subgenres such as thrash metal , hair metal and death metal . Soul music became a musical genre that came to include a wide variety of R&B-based music styles from the pop R&B acts at Motown Records in Detroit, such as

6681-736: The 2009 Manchester International Festival ) four members of the GB cycling squad ( Jason Kenny , Ed Clancy , Jamie Staff and Geraint Thomas ) rode around the Velodrome while the band performed "Tour de France". The group also played several festival dates, the last being at the Bestival 2009 in September, on the Isle of Wight . 2009 also saw the release of The Catalogue box set in November. It

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6812-766: The 47th Montreux Jazz Festival. The band also played a 3-D concert on 12 July at Scotland's biggest festival – T in the Park – in Balado, Kinross, as well as 20 July at Latitude Festival in Suffolk, and 21 July at the Longitude Festival in Dublin. In October 2013 the band played four concerts, over two nights, in Eindhoven , Netherlands. The venue, Evoluon (the former technology museum of Philips Electronics , now

6943-499: The African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Latin music is a genre of music that originated in the United States due to the growing influence of Latino Americans in the music industry. It is a term used by the music industry to describe music in a catch-all category for various music styles from Ibero-America . Pop

7074-532: The American and British groups' emphasis on jazz and classical elements in favor of "a droning, pulsating sound that owed more to the avant garde than to rock & roll." Some common musical features exhibited by krautrock artists include: Despite a common approach and generational attitude among artists, the New Statesman argues that "in truth, no two Krautrock acts sound remotely alike. Compare

7205-752: The Cirkus in Stockholm, Sweden and at the music festival Summer Sonic in Tokyo, Japan. In November 2014 the 3D Catalogue live set was played in Paris, France, at the brand new Fondation Louis-Vuitton from 6 to 14 November. and then in the iconic Paradiso concert hall in Amsterdam , Netherlands , where they played before in 1976. In 2015, Ralf Hütter, being told that the Tour de France would be starting that year in

7336-518: The Japanese lyrics in 2012. Kraftwerk have been recognized as pioneers of electronic music as well as subgenres such as electropop , art pop , house music , synth-pop and electronic rock . In its early incarnation, the band pursued an avant-garde , experimental rock style inspired by the compositions of Karlheinz Stockhausen . Hütter has also listed the Beach Boys as

7467-481: The Lumineers (American folk) are examples of contemporary folk music, which has been recorded and adapted to the new way of listening to music (online)—unlike the traditional way of orally transmitting music. Each country in the world, in some cases each region, district and community, has its own folk music style. The sub-divisions of folk genre are developed by each place, cultural identity and history. Because

7598-969: The No Nukes 2012 Festival in Tokyo, Japan. Kraftwerk were also going to play at the Ultra Music Festival in Warsaw , but the event was cancelled; instead, Kraftwerk performed at Way Out West in Gothenburg . A limited edition version of the Catalogue box set was released during the retrospective, restricted to 2000 sets. Each box was individually numbered and inverted the colour scheme of the standard box. In December, Kraftwerk stated on their website that they would be playing their Catalogue in Düsseldorf and at London's Tate Modern. Kraftwerk tickets were priced at £60 in London, but fans compared that to

7729-717: The Radio-Activity tour Kraftwerk began recording Trans-Europe Express (German: Trans-Europa-Express ) at the Kling Klang Studio. Trans-Europe Express was mixed at the Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles. It was around this time that Hütter and Schneider met David Bowie at the Kling Klang Studio. A collaboration was mentioned in an interview ( Brian Eno ) with Hütter, but it never materialised. The release of Trans-Europe Express in March 1977

7860-571: The Recording Academy honoured Kraftwerk with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award . They later won the Grammy Award for Best Dance/Electronic Album with their live album 3-D The Catalogue (2017) at the 2018 ceremony . In 2021, Kraftwerk was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in the early influence category. As of 2024, the band continues to tour , with the members' live performances celebrating Kraftwerk's fiftieth anniversary. Florian Schneider (flutes, synthesizers, violin) and Ralf Hütter (organ, synthesizers) met as students at

7991-535: The Residents released art music albums. Popular music is any musical style accessible to the general public and disseminated by the mass media. Musicologist and popular music specialist Philip Tagg defined the notion in the light of sociocultural and economical aspects: Popular music, unlike art music, is (1) conceived for mass distribution to large and often socioculturally heterogeneous groups of listeners, (2) stored and distributed in non-written form, (3) only possible in an industrial monetary economy where it becomes

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8122-533: The Temptations , Gladys Knight & the Pips , Marvin Gaye and Four Tops , to " deep soul " singers such as Percy Sledge and James Carr . The polka is originally a Czech dance and genre of dance music familiar throughout Europe and the Americas. Religious music (also referred as sacred music) is music performed or composed for religious use or through religious influence. Gospel , spiritual, and Christian music are examples of religious music. Traditional and folk music are very similar categories. Although

8253-440: The UK, in April 1971. The music emerging in Germany was first covered extensively in three concurrent issues of the UK music paper New Musical Express in the month of December 1972, by journalist Ian MacDonald . Its musicians tended to reject the name "krautrock". This was also the case for "kosmische Musik". Musicologist Julian Cope , in his book Krautrocksampler , says "krautrock is a subjective British phenomenon", based on

8384-619: The Velvet Underground , the Beatles , and Pink Floyd . A significant influence was the work of American minimalists such as Riley, Tony Conrad , and La Monte Young , as well as the late '60s albums of jazz musician Miles Davis , particularly his jazz fusion work on In a Silent Way (1969). The influence of Jimi Hendrix and James Brown on krautrock musicians was also notable. Some artists drew on ideas from 20th century classical music and musique concrète , particularly composer Stockhausen (with whom, for example, Irmin Schmidt and Holger Czukay of Can had previously studied), and from

8515-494: The band for eight months to focus on completing his university studies, played synthesizer and keyboards (including Farfisa organ and electric piano). The band released two free-form experimental rock albums, Kraftwerk (1970) and Kraftwerk 2 (1972). The albums were mostly exploratory musical improvisations played on a variety of traditional instruments including guitar, bass, drums, organ, flute, and violin. Post-production modifications to these recordings were used to distort

8646-446: The band for the first time to control the electronic sources creating the rhythmic sound of the album Trans-Europe Express . Since 2002, Kraftwerk's live performances have been conducted with the use of virtual technology (i.e. software replicating and replacing original analogue or digital equipment). According to Fritz Hilpert , "the mobility of music technology and the reliability of the notebooks and software have greatly simplified

8777-451: The band in 1973 and Karl Bartos in 1975, expanding the band to a quartet. On commercially successful albums such as Autobahn (1974), Trans-Europe Express (1977), The Man-Machine (1978), and Computer World (1981), Kraftwerk developed a self-described "robot pop" style that combined electronic music with pop melodies, sparse arrangements, and repetitive rhythms, while adopting a stylized image including matching suits. Following

8908-437: The band were not convinced, and the theme was left to the single alone. "Tour de France" was released in German and French. The vocals of the song were recorded on the Kling Klang Studio stairs to create the right atmosphere. "Tour de France" was featured in the 1984 film Breakin' , showing the influence that Kraftwerk had on West Coast Hip Hop . In May or June 1982, during the recording of "Tour de France", Ralf Hütter

9039-409: The band's equipment increasingly reduced manual playing, replacing it with interactive control of sequencing equipment. Hütter retained the most manual performance, still playing musical lines by hand on a controller keyboard and singing live vocals and having a repeating ostinato . Schneider's live vocoding had been replaced by software-controlled speech-synthesis techniques. In November, the group made

9170-401: The book Krautrocksampler on the subject. The genre also had a strong influence on David Bowie 's Station to Station (1976) and the experimentation it inspired led to his ' Berlin Trilogy '. Ash Ra Tempel 's first album, released in 1971, informed later krautrock music. Kosmischer Läufer , a Scottish-German music project with its first installment launched in 2013, presents itself as

9301-514: The book were titled Kraftwerk: I Was a Robot . In 1999, Kraftwerk were commissioned to create an a cappella jingle for the Hannover Expo 2000 world's fair in Germany. The jingle was subsequently developed into the single " Expo 2000 ", which was released in December 1999, and remixed and re-released as "Expo Remix" in November 2000. In August 2003 the band released Tour de France Soundtracks , its first album of new material since 1986's Electric Café . In January and February 2003, before

9432-537: The challenging and provocative character, within the universe of modern music. Reggae music, originating from the late 1960s Jamaica , is a genre of music that was originally used by Jamaicans to define themselves with their lifestyle and social aspects. The meaning behind reggae songs tend to be about love, faith or a higher power, and freedom. Reggae music is important to Jamaican culture as it has been used as inspiration for many third world liberation movements. Bob Marley , an artist primarily known for reggae music,

9563-475: The commercial success of Autobahn in the US, where it peaked at number 5 in the Billboard Top LPs & Tapes , Hütter and Schneider invested in updating their studio, thus lessening their reliance on outside producers. At this time the painter and graphic artist Emil Schult became a regular collaborator, designing artwork, cowriting lyrics, and accompanying the group on tour. The year 1975 saw

9694-467: The concert, invited by Kraftwerk. Concertgoers were offered 3D glasses to perceive stereoscopic effects on the video screen. In April 2017, Kraftwerk announced 3-D The Catalogue , a live album and video documenting performances of all eight albums in The Catalogue that was released 26 May 2017. It is available in multiple formats, the most extensive of which being a 4-disc Blu-ray set with

9825-435: The development of ambient music and techno , and influenced subsequent genres such as post-punk , new-age music , and post-rock . Krautrock has been described as a broad genre encompassing varied approaches, but commonly drawing on psychedelia , avant-garde collage, electronic sounds, and rock music , while typically featuring "improvisation and hypnotic, minimalistic rhythms." Los Angeles Magazine summarized

9956-479: The device did not work as planned, and it was quickly abandoned. The same year Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider commissioned Bonn -based "Synthesizerstudio Bonn, Matten & Wiechers" to design and build the Synthanorma Sequenzer with Intervallomat, a 4×8 / 2×16 / 1×32 step-sequencer system with some features that commercial products couldn't provide at that time. The music sequencer was used by

10087-479: The diverse German scene, and although many such artists disliked the term, it is no longer considered controversial by German artists in the 21st century. Despite this, English-language authors remain critical of it. The movement was partly born out of the radical student protests of 1968 , as German youth rebelled against their country's legacy in World War II and sought a popular music distinct from traditional German music and American pop. The period contributed to

10218-456: The dreamy synthesiser washes of Tangerine Dream with the alien noise collages of Faust or the psychedelic funk of Can ." However, a common feature is the " motorik " beat: the 4/4 beat often used by drummers associated with krautrock, characterised by a kick drum -heavy, pulsating groove, that created a forward-flowing feel. The motorik beat was used by Can in the song " Mother Sky ", by Neu! on their debut album , and by Kraftwerk in

10349-424: The electronic pop tunes for which they are best known. In 1976, Kraftwerk toured in support of the Radio-Activity album. David Bowie was among the fans of the record and invited the band to support him on his Station to Station tour, an offer the group declined. Despite some innovations in touring, Kraftwerk took a break from live performances after the Radio-Activity tour of 1976. After having finished

10480-421: The employee of The Echo Nest , music intelligence and data platform, owned by Spotify , has created a categorical perception spectrum of genres and subgenres based on "an algorithmically generated, readability-adjusted scatter-plot of the musical genre-space, based on data tracked and analyzed for 5,315 genre-shaped distinctions by Spotify" called Every Noise at Once . Alternatively, music can be assessed on

10611-401: The end of 1900s, Vincenzo Caporaletti has proposed a more comprehensive distinction of music genres based on the "formative medium" with which a music is created, that is the creative interface (cognitive milieu) employed by the artist. Following this framework, formative media may belong to two different matrixes: visual or audiotactile with regards to the role played in the creative process by

10742-636: The exhibit. Kraftwerk played at Ultra Music Festival in Miami on 23 March 2012. Initiated by Klaus Biesenbach , the Museum of Modern Art of New York organized an exhibit titled Kraftwerk – Retrospective 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 where the band performed their studio discography from Autobahn to Tour de France over the course of eight days to sell-out crowds. The exhibit later toured to the Tate Gallery as well as to K20 in Düsseldorf. Kraftwerk performed at

10873-816: The façades of castles and other historic buildings in a special way. In May 2024, they performed nine nights at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, presenting one of their eight albums each night and another concert as the ninth gig. On 27 July 2024, at the Fuji Rock Festival in Naeba , Kraftwerk played a cover version of another artist's work for the first time: " Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence " by Ryuichi Sakamoto , who died in 2023. Hütter had been friends with Sakamoto since 1981. After performing "Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence", Kraftwerk played "Radioactivity", for which Sakamoto wrote

11004-624: The final mix. The Man-Machine was the first Kraftwerk album where Karl Bartos was cocredited as a songwriter. The cover, produced in black, white and red, was inspired by Russian artist El Lissitzky and the Suprematism movement. Gunther Frohling photographed the group for the cover, a now-iconic image which featured the quartet dressed in red shirts and black ties. After it was released Kraftwerk did not release another album or tour for three years. In May 1981 Kraftwerk released Computer World (German: Computerwelt ) on EMI Records . It

11135-434: The first time, and Schneider processing his voice with a vocoder live. Wolfgang Flür and new recruit Karl Bartos performed on home-made electronic percussion instruments. Bartos also used a Deagan vibraphone on stage. The Hütter-Schneider-Bartos-Flür formation remained in place until the late 1980s and is now regarded as the classic live line-up of Kraftwerk. Emil Schult generally fulfilled the role of tour manager. After

11266-449: The genre as "American psychedelica meets icy Germanic detachment." Melody Maker described the style as "where the over-reaching ambition and untethered freakitude of late '60s acid rock is checked and galvanised by a proto-punk minimalism ... music of immense scale that miraculously avoided prog-rock 's bombastics.” AllMusic described it as expanding on the territory associated with art rock and progressive rock, but diverging from

11397-539: The group for rehearsals, and the unit performed as a trio on the television show Aspekte for German television network ZDF . With Ralf und Florian , released in 1973, Kraftwerk began to rely more heavily on synthesizers and drum machines. Although almost entirely instrumental, the album marks Kraftwerk's first use of the vocoder in the song "Ananas Symphonie" (Pineapple Symphony,) which became one of its musical signatures. According to English music journalist Simon Reynolds , Kraftwerk were influenced by what he called

11528-401: The image of Kraftwerk; subsequently he encouraged the group to become vegetarians and take up cycling. "Tour de France" included sounds that followed this theme including bicycle chains, gear mechanisms and the breathing of the cyclist. At the time of the single's release Ralf Hütter tried to persuade the rest of the band that they should record a whole album based on cycling. The other members of

11659-410: The inner cities during the 1970s. It can be broadly defined as a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping , a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted. Hip hop music derives from the hip hop culture itself, including four key elements: emceeing ( MCing )/ rapping , Disc jockeying (DJing) with turntablism , breakdancing and graffiti art . Jazz is a music genre that originated in

11790-402: The intersection of two or more genres, sharing characteristics of each parent genre, and therefore belong to each of them at the same time. Such subgenres are known as fusion genres . Examples of fusion genres include jazz fusion , which is a fusion of jazz and rock music, and country rock which is a fusion of country music and rock music. A microgenre is a niche genre, as well as

11921-548: The late 1960s , but, significantly, it has continued to be a part of its playing even as it makes ever greater use of digital and computer-controlled sequencing in its performances. Some of the band's familiar compositions have been observed to have developed from live improvisations at its concerts or sound-checks. Throughout their career, Kraftwerk have pushed the limits of music technology with some notable innovations, such as home-made instruments and custom-built devices. The group has always perceived their Kling Klang Studio as

12052-406: The like. They were influenced by the modernist Bauhaus aesthetic, seeing art as inseparable from everyday function. Usually, the lyrics are very minimal but reveal both an innocent celebration of, and a knowing caution about, the modern world, as well as playing an integral role in the rhythmic structure of the songs. Many of Kraftwerk's songs express the paradoxical nature of modern urban life:

12183-498: The most sought-after studios in the late 1970s. Plank co-produced the first four Kraftwerk albums. The release of Autobahn in 1974 saw Kraftwerk moving away from the sound of its first three albums. Hütter and Schneider had invested in newer technology such as the Minimoog and the EMS Synthi AKS , helping give Kraftwerk a newer, "disciplined" sound. Autobahn was also the last album that Conny Plank engineered. After

12314-428: The music generally moved away from the rhythm & blues roots and song structure found in traditional Anglo-American rock music . Prominent groups associated with the krautrock label included Neu! , Can , Faust , Tangerine Dream , Kraftwerk , Cluster , Ash Ra Tempel , Popol Vuh , Amon Düül II and Harmonia . The term "krautrock" was popularised by British music journalists as a humorous umbrella-label for

12445-482: The music is developed in different places, many of the instruments are characteristic to location and population—but some are used everywhere: button or piano accordion , different types of flutes or trumpets, banjo , and ukulele . Both French and Scottish folk music use related instruments such as the fiddle , the harp and variations of bagpipes . Since music has become more easily accessible ( Spotify , iTunes , YouTube, etc.), more people have begun listening to

12576-579: The nearby Dutch city of Utrecht , decided that Kraftwerk would perform during the "Grand Départ". Eventually the band played three concerts 3 and 4 July in TivoliVredenburg performing "Tour de France Soundtracks" and visited the start of the Tour in-between. At the request of race director Christian Prudhomme , Kraftwerk performed at the Tour de France on 1 July 2017, this time in Kraftwerk's hometown Düsseldorf . French electronic band Air opened

12707-472: The new experimental directions that emerged in jazz during the 1960s and 1970s (mainly the free jazz pieces by Ornette Coleman or Albert Ayler ). Moving away from the patterns of song structure and melody of much rock music in America and Britain, some in the movement were drawn to a more mechanical and electronic sound. Until around 1973, the word Deutsch-Rock ("German Rock") was used to refer to

12838-478: The new groups from West Germany. Other names thrown around by the British and American music press were "Teutonic rock", "Überrock" and " Götterdämmer rock". West Germany's music press initially used Krautrock as a pejorative, but the term lost its stigma after the music gained success in Britain. The term derives from the ethnic slur " kraut ". "Kraut" in German can refer to herbs, weeds, and drugs. The term

12969-539: The new record. Even though Radio-Activity was less commercially successful than Autobahn in the UK and United States, the album served to open up the European market for Kraftwerk, earning them a gold disc in France. Kraftwerk made videos and performed several European live dates to promote the album. With the release of Autobahn and Radio-Activity , Kraftwerk left behind avant-garde experimentation and moved towards

13100-478: The period of history when they were created and the social class in which they developed. Some examples of the Folk Genre can be seen in the folk music of England and Turkish folk music . English folk music has developed since the medieval period and has been transmitted from that time until today. Similarly, Turkish folk music relates to all the civilizations that once passed thorough Turkey, thereby being

13231-508: The piss ... and when you hear the so-called 'krautrock renaissance', it makes me think everything we did was for nothing." Kosmische Musik ("cosmic music") is a term which came into regular use before "krautrock" and was preferred by some German artists who disliked the English label; today, it is often used synonymously with krautrock. More specifically, it may describe 1970s German electronic music which uses synthesizers and incorporates themes related to space or otherworldliness; it

13362-457: The realization of complex touring setups: we generate all sounds on the laptops in real time and manipulate them with controller maps. It takes almost no time to get our compact stage system set up for performance. [...] This way, we can bring our Kling-Klang Studio with us on stage. The physical light weight of our equipment also translates into an enormous ease of use when working with software synthesizers and sound processors. Every tool imaginable

13493-518: The release of Electric Café (1986), Flür left the group in 1987, followed by Bartos in 1990. The band released Tour de France Soundtracks , their latest album of new material, in 2003. Founding member Schneider left in 2008. The band, with new members, has continued to tour under the leadership of Hütter. The band's work has influenced a diverse range of artists and many genres of modern music, including synth-pop , hip hop , post-punk , techno , house music , ambient , and club music . In 2014,

13624-453: The release of the album, the band started the extensive Minimum-Maximum world tour, using four customised Sony VAIO laptop computers, effectively leaving the entire Kling Klang studio at home in Germany. The group also obtained a new set of transparent video panels to replace its four large projection screens. This greatly streamlined the running of all of the group's sequencing, sound-generating, and visual-display software. From this point,

13755-438: The rest of the world, with occasional variations in other languages when conceptually appropriate. Live performance has always played an important part in Kraftwerk's activities. Also, despite its live shows generally being based around formal songs and compositions, live improvisation often plays a noticeable role in its performances. This trait can be traced back to the group's roots in the first experimental Krautrock scene of

13886-444: The road. They also made greater use of live visuals including back-projected slides and films synchronized with the music as the technology developed, the use of hand-held miniaturized instruments during the set, and the use of replica mannequins of themselves to perform on stage during the song "The Robots". In 1982 Kraftwerk began to work on a new album that initially had the working title Technicolor but due to trademark issues

14017-551: The song " Autobahn " on their album of the same name , later being adopted by other krautrock bands. It has been widely used in many different styles of music beyond krautrock. According to XLR8R , the term krautrock is often used by critics to signify the "mesmerizing motorik rhythms pioneered by Can and Neu!", but contested that "they represent merely a tiny fraction of the music that emerged from Germany during krautrock's Golden Age". Krautrock emerged in West Germany during

14148-495: The sound of the instruments, particularly audio-tape manipulation and multiple dubbings of one instrument on the same track. Both albums are purely instrumental. Live performances from 1972 to 1973 were mostly made as a duo, using a simple beat-box-type electronic drum machine with preset rhythms taken from an electric organ. Occasionally, they performed with bass players as well. These shows were mainly in Germany, with occasional shows in France. Later in 1973, Wolfgang Flür joined

14279-626: The standard forms of music notation that evolved in Europe, beginning well before the Renaissance and reaching its maturity in the Romantic period. The identity of a "work" or "piece" of art music is usually defined by the notated version rather than by a particular performance and is primarily associated with the composer rather than the performer (though composers may leave performers with some opportunity for interpretation or improvisation). This

14410-420: The style as "cosmic rock" to signify that the music belonged in a rock idiom. German producer Conny Plank was a central figure in the kosmische sound, emphasizing texture, effects processing , and tape-based editing techniques. Plank oversaw kosmische recordings such as Kraftwerk 's Autobahn , Neu! 's Neu! 75 , and Cluster 's Zuckerzeit . Several of these artists would later distance themselves from

14541-658: The term. Other names for the style, and for sub-genres were "Berlin School" and "Dusseldorf School", both of which are recognised and actively contributed to by artists such as Node, Martin Sturtzer, Propaganda, Kraftwerk, Tannheuser and Fritz Mayr, from the 1980s through to the present day. The style would later lead to the development of new-age music , with which it shared several characteristics. It would also exert lasting influence on subsequent electronic music and avant-garde rock . Krautrock has proved to be highly influential on

14672-586: The three dimensions of "arousal", "valence", and "depth". Arousal reflects physiological processes such as stimulation and relaxation (intense, forceful, abrasive, thrilling vs. gentle, calming, mellow), valence reflects emotion and mood processes (fun, happy, lively, enthusiastic, joyful vs. depressing, sad), and depth reflects cognitive processes (intelligent, sophisticated, inspiring, complex, poetic, deep, emotional, thoughtful vs. party music, danceable). These help explain why many people like similar songs from different traditionally segregated genres. Starting from

14803-451: The traditional music is a very broad category and can include several genres, it is widely accepted that traditional music encompasses folk music. According to the ICTM (International Council for Traditional Music), traditional music are songs and tunes that have been performed over a long period of time (usually several generations) . The folk music genre is classified as the music that

14934-509: The use of sequencing equipment for both percussion and music. In contrast to their cool and controlled image, the group used sequencers interactively, which allowed for live improvisation. Ironically, Kraftwerk did not own a computer at the time of recording Computer World . Kraftwerk returned to live performance with the Computer World tour of 1981, where the band effectively packed up its entire Kling Klang studio and took it along on

15065-457: The visual rationality or the bodily sensitivity and embodied cognition. The theory developed by Caporaletti, named Audiotactile Music Theory, categorises music in three different branches: 1) written music, like the so-called classical music, that is created using the visual matrix; 2) oral music (like folk music or ethnic music before the advent of sound recording technologies); 3) Audiotactile music, which are process of production and transmission

15196-410: The way the music was received in the UK rather than on the actual West German music scene out of which it grew. For instance, while one of the main groups originally tagged as krautrock, Faust , recorded a seminal 12-minute track they titled " Krautrock ", they would later distance themselves from the term, saying: "When the English people started talking about krautrock, we thought they were just taking

15327-485: The world with Kraftwerk as a drummer in 1981, his playing does not appear on that year's Computer World or on the 1986 album Electric Café . In 1987 he left the band and was replaced by Fritz Hilpert . After years of withdrawal from live performance Kraftwerk began to tour Europe more frequently. In February 1990 the band played a few secret shows in Italy. Karl Bartos left the band shortly afterwards. The next proper tour

15458-462: The world. It emphasizes formal styles that invite technical and detailed deconstruction and criticism, and demand focused attention from the listener. In Western practice, art music is considered primarily a written musical tradition, preserved in some form of music notation rather than being transmitted orally, by rote, or in recordings, as popular and traditional music usually are. Historically, most western art music has been written down using

15589-518: Was cancelled moments before it was scheduled to begin, due to Fritz Hilpert experiencing a medical emergency. In 2009, Kraftwerk performed concerts with special 3D background graphics in Wolfsburg, Germany; Manchester, UK; and Randers, Denmark. Members of the audience were able to watch this multimedia part of the show with 3D glasses, which were given out. During the Manchester concert (part of

15720-486: Was changed to Electric Café for its original release in 1986 (for a remastered re-release in 2009, it was retitled again after its original working title, Techno Pop ). One of the songs from these recording sessions was " Tour de France ", which EMI released as a single in 1983. This song was a reflection of the band's new-found obsession for cycling. After the physically demanding Computer World tour, Ralf Hütter had been looking for forms of exercise that fitted in with

15851-426: Was coined by Edgar Froese and later used by record producer Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser as a marketing name for bands such as Ash Ra Tempel , Tangerine Dream, and Klaus Schulze . The following year, Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser 's Ohr Records used the term when he released the compilation Kosmische Musik (1972) featuring tracks by Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Ash Ra Tempel, and Popol Vuh . Kaiser eventually began referring to

15982-477: Was eventually released in a different set of remasters in November 2009. In June 2005 the band's first-ever official live album, Minimum-Maximum , which was compiled from the shows during the band's tour of spring 2004, received praise from NME . The album contained reworked tracks from existing studio albums. This included a track titled "Planet of Visions" that was a reworking of "Expo 2000". In support of this release, Kraftwerk made another quick sweep around

16113-588: Was honored by Zimbabwe's 1980 Independence celebration due to his music giving inspirations to freedom fighters. The music genre of reggae is known to incorporate stylistic techniques from rhythm and blues , jazz , African, Caribbean, and other genres as well but what makes reggae unique are the vocals and lyrics. The vocals tend to be sung in Jamaican Patois , Jamaican English , and Iyaric dialects. The lyrics of reggae music usually tend to raise political awareness and on cultural perspectives. Rock music

16244-460: Was in 1991, for the album The Mix . Hütter and Schneider wished to continue the synth-pop quartet style of presentation, and recruited Fernando Abrantes as a replacement for Bartos. Abrantes left the band shortly after though. In late 1991, long-time Kling Klang Studio sound engineer Henning Schmitz was brought in to finish the remainder of the tour and to complete a new version of the quartet that remained active until 2008. In 1997 Kraftwerk made

16375-418: Was involved in a serious cycling accident. He suffered head injuries and remained in a coma for several days. During 1983 Wolfgang Flür was beginning to spend less time in the studio. Since the band began using sequencers his role as a drummer was becoming less frequent. He preferred to spend his time travelling with his girlfriend. Flür was also experiencing artistic difficulties with the band. Though he toured

16506-502: Was marked with an extravagant train journey used as a press conference by EMI France. The album won a disco award in New York later that year. In May 1978 Kraftwerk released The Man-Machine (German: Die Mensch-Maschine ), recorded at the Kling Klang Studio. Due to the complexity of the recording, the album was mixed at Studio Rudas in Düsseldorf. The band hired sound engineer Leanard Jackson from Detroit to work with Joschko Rudas on

16637-461: Was originally used by Virgin records in 1972. Various sources claim that "krautrock" was originally a humorous term coined in the early 1970s, either by British disc jockey John Peel or by the UK music newspaper Melody Maker , in which experimental German bands found an early and enthusiastic following. The first use of the term however, was found in a full-page advertisement from Popo Music Management and Bacillus Records promoting German Rock in

16768-411: Was recorded at Kling Klang Studio between 1978 and 1981. Much of this time was spent modifying the studio to make it portable so the band could take it on tour. Some of the electronic vocals on Computer World were generated using a Texas Instruments language translator. " Computer Love " was released as a single backed with the Man-Machine track " The Model ". Radio DJs were more interested in

16899-511: Was reissued in Europe by EMI after it had been out of print for several years. It was released for the first time on CD in addition to a repressing of the 12-inch vinyl single. Both versions feature slightly altered artwork that removed the faces of Flür and Bartos from the four-man cycling paceline depicted on the original cover. In 1999 ex-member Flür published his autobiography in Germany, Ich war ein Roboter . Later English-language editions of

17030-474: Was their second appearance at the festival since 2004. Further shows were performed in Ireland, Poland, Ukraine , Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore later that year. The touring quartet consisted of Ralf Hütter, Henning Schmitz, Fritz Hilpert , and video technician Stefan Pfaffe, who became an official member in 2008. Original member Florian Schneider was absent from the lineup. Hütter stated that he

17161-653: Was working on other projects. On 21 November, Kraftwerk officially confirmed Florian Schneider's departure from the band; The Independent commented: "There is something brilliantly Kraftwerkian about the news that Florian Schneider, a founder member of the German electronic pioneers, is leaving the band to pursue a solo career. Many successful bands break up after just a few years. It has apparently taken Schneider and his musical partner, Ralf Hütter, four decades to discover musical differences." Kraftwerk's headline set at Global Gathering in Melbourne, Australia, on 22 November

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