Kraftwerk and thier Influence

Four years ago I had the privilege of seeing one of music's leading pioneers in electronic and Hip-Hop music. Kraftwerk. I can't say  that I wasn't excited to bits! They had human looking robots performing rather than them on stage, moving knobs and playing synthesizer keys. I couldn't believe it! For those of you who don't know what I was so stoked about here's a little information about who Kraftwerk is.

In Germany, 1970 when the world was taking acid and smoking tons of pot, the founding members of Kraftwerk Ralf Hutter and Florian Schneider were probably in their basements honing their craft. These guys were way ahead of their time using computer sounds to produce at that time music that was only experimented with. The vocoder, programmed computers, flutes and synthesizers were just a few instruments they used to make groundbreaking music that would influence and change the music world. The group has been around for over several decades and has gone through about 11 members.

In 1974 Autobahn was released. This album was their ticket to the US, Canada and the UK. In 1978 Kraftwerk released The man the machine. Four years later, the Hip-Hop group The Fearless Four released "Rockin it" sampling The man the machine.

Click here to view the Fearless Four sample

Computers were on the rise within society in the 80's. This is what Kraftwerk wanted to reflect in their 1981 album Computer World. "It's more fun to compute" was a track released on that album which later influenced Hip-Hop group Afro Rican's "Give it all you got".

Click here for Afro Rican sample

1983 held one of Kraftwerk's most influential pieces. "Tour de France" was one of their most complicated songs because of the set of variants. It took the group to #22 in the UK singles chart. Within that same year one of the originators of break beat DJing, African Bambaataa sampled Tour de France producing "Planet Rock"

Growing up as an 80's kid I remember watching the break dancing movie "Breakin". In the movie there is a scene were Turbo, a b-boy dances with a broom. In that famous scene the song he dances to is Kraftwerks Tour de France.

Throughout the years up until present time we still hear Kraftwerk's influence. Not only through Hip-Hop but through electronic music and other genres. So if you haven't had the chance to listen to Kraftwerk I suggest you put your robot ears on and do it.

-Corrin