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Krautrock (also called "kosmische Musik", German: ".mw-parser-output .noitalicfont-style:normal
cosmic music"^[8][9]) is a broad genre of experimental rock that developed in Germany in the late 1960s among bands drawing on diverse sources such as psychedelic rock, the avant-garde, electronic music, funk, minimalism, jazz improvisation, and world music styles.^[5][10] The term "krautrock" was coined by English-speaking music journalists in the early 1970s as a humorous umbrella label for the varied German scene. Largely divorced from the traditional blues and rock and roll influences of British and American rock music up to that time, the period contributed to the evolution of electronic and ambient music as well as the birth of post-punk, alternative rock and new-age music.^[5][11]

Characteristics

Influences

Krautrock merges elements of psychedelic rock, the avant-garde, electronic music, funk, improvisational jazz and world music styles,^[5] and expands on the type of musical explorations associated with art rock and progressive rock.^[12] Critic Simon Reynolds 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."^[5] Groups synthesised rock and roll rhythm and energy with a desire to distance themselves from specifically American blues origins, drawing on German or other sources instead. Jean-Hervé Peron of Faust said: "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."^[13] According to Peel, the only American or British band to "clearly influence" the genre was England's Pink Floyd, particularly for their "spacey music".^[14]

Some artists drew on ideas from contemporary experimental classical music (especially minimalism^[15] and composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, with whom, for example, Irmin Schmidt and Holger Czukay of Can had previously studied) and from 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 also drove the music to a more mechanical and electronic sound.^[11]

Motorik

Motorik is the 4/4 beat often used by drummers associated with krautrock.^[16] It is characterised by a bass drum-heavy, pulsating groove, that created a forward-flowing feel.^[16] The motorik beat was first used by Neu! on their debut album^[17] and was later adopted by other krautrock bands. It has been widely used in many different styles of music beyond krautrock.^[18]

Kosmische Musik

Kosmische Musik ("cosmic music") is a style closely related to 1970s German electronic music that uses synthesizers and incorporates themes related to space and otherworldliness.^[19][20] The term came into regular use before "krautrock", though it is now sometimes used synonymously.^[19] The style was often instrumental and characterized by "spacy," ambient soundscapes.^[20] Kosmische artists used synthesizers such as the EMS VCS 3 and Moog Modular, as well as sound processing effects and tape-based approaches.^[19] They largely rejected rock music conventions, and instead drew on "serious" electronic compositions such as those of György Ligeti.^[20]

The term "kosmische Musik" was coined by Edgar Froese in the liner notes of Tangerine Dream's 1971 album Alpha Centauri^[20] or by record producer Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser as a marketing name for krautrock bands like Ash Ra Tempel, Tangerine Dream, and Klaus Schulze.^[21] The following year, Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser's Ohr Records released the compilation Kosmische Musik (1972) featuring tracks by Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Ash Ra Tempel, and Popol Vuh.^[19] Several of these artists would later distance themselves from the term.^[19] The style would later lead to the development of new-age music, with which it shared several characteristics.^[20]

Origins and etymology

A German student protest from 1968

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 that incorporated 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.^[22] 1968 also saw the foundation of the Zodiak Free Arts Lab in Berlin by Hans-Joachim Roedelius, and Conrad Schnitzler, which further popularized the psychedelic rock sound in the German mainstream.^[23] Such developments influenced what came to be termed "krautrock", which appeared at the first major German rock festival in 1968 in Essen.^{[24][clarification needed]} Like their American, British and international counterparts, German rock musicians played a kind of psychedelic music. In contrast, however, there was no attempt to reproduce the effects of drugs.^{[5][not in citation given]}

Until around 1973, the word "Deutsch-Rock" ("German Rock") was used to refer to the new groups from West Germany.^[25] "Krautrock" was originally a humorous term coined in the early 1970s by British disc jockey John Peel^[26] or by the UK music newspaper Melody Maker, in which experimental German bands found an early and enthusiastic following, and ironically retained by its practitioners.^[27] The term derives from the ethnic slur "kraut", and its use by the music press was inspired by a track from Amon Düül's Psychedelic Underground titled "Mama Düül und Ihre Sauerkrautband Spielt Auf" ('Mama Düül and her Sauerkrautband Strike Up').^[28][29][30] According to author Ulrich Adelt, "kraut" in German can refer to herbs, weeds, and drugs.^[21] Other names thrown around by the British music press were "Teutonic rock" and "Götterdämmer rock".^[21]

Its musicians tended to reject the name "krautrock".^[30][21] This was also the case for "kosmische Musik".^[21] Musicologist Julian Cope, in his book Krautrocksampler, says "Krautrock is a subjective British phenomenon," based on the way the music was received in the UK rather than on the actual West German music scene out of which it grew.^[28] 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 the piss... and when you hear the so-called 'Krautrock renaissance,' it makes me think everything we did was for nothing."^[13] West Germany's music press initially used "krautrock" as a pejorative, but the term lost its stigma after the music gained success in Britain.^[21]

Legacy and influence

Krautrock has proved to be highly influential on 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 ^[31] 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 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'.^[32][33]

Krautrock was also highly influential on the late-'70s development of British new wave and post-punk, notably artists such as Siouxsie and the Banshees, Public Image Ltd., Cabaret Voltaire, The Fall, Gary Numan, Joy Division, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Simple Minds and This Heat, and on Galloping Coroners' shaman punk. Kraftwerk in particular had a lot of influence on American electronic dance music of the 1980s: electro, house, techno and especially goatrance. Ash Ra Tempel was strongly influential on the later development of 70s ambient as well as post-rock.^[34]

List of artists

See also

References

Bibliography

External links

• Krautrock @ pHinnWeb


• krautrock website


• 
  Krautrocksite - Online-Magazin from Germany