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Kraftwerk (album)

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For the Sarah Connor album, see Kraftwerk (Sarah Connor album).

Kraftwerk
Studio album by
Kraftwerk
ReleasedNovember 1970
RecordedJuly–September 1970
Genre
Length39:39
LabelPhilips
Producer
Kraftwerk chronology
Kraftwerk
(1970) 		Kraftwerk 2
(1972)

Kraftwerk is the debut studio album by German electronic band Kraftwerk. It was released in Germany in 1970, and produced by Konrad "Conny" Plank.

Background and recording

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After the commercial failure of Tone Float, Organisation were dropped by RCA Records while Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider signed a new deal with Philips and named their new project Kraftwerk.[1] To begin work, the duo rented an empty workshop in an industrial era near a railway station in Düsseldorf, which would eventually become Kling Klang Studio.[1]

The album was recorded from July to September 1970[2] and was produced by colleague Conny Plank, who shared the credit with Hütter and Schneider.[1] They were also joined by two drummers during the recording of the album: Andreas Hohmann and Klaus Dinger.[3] Hohmann played on "Ruckzuck"[3][1] and "Stratovarius",[1] while Dinger played on "Vom Himmel Hoch".[4] The other instrumentation features Hütter on bass, as well as both Hammond and Tubon electric organs, the latter made by Swedish factory Joh Mustad AB in 1966,[5][6] while Schneider plays the flute.[5]

Music

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Ned Ragget, writing for AllMusic, called Kraftwerk "an exploratory art rock album with psych roots" and "sudden jump cuts of musique concrète noise and circular jamming as prone to sprawl as it is to tight focus".[7] Adam Blyweiss described it as "credible jazz, rock noise and funk jiggle".[8]

The song "Ruckzuck" is driven by a motorik groove[1] and powerful multi-dubbed flute riff.[9] Hütter plays a piano line on a modified Hammond organ, and many instruments on the album were manipulated by a pitch-to-voltage converter, which converts sound into voltage that powers a synthesizer.[10] NME characterized "Ruckzuck" as "skirting around the edges of free jazz".[11]

Jason Anderson of Uncut noted that "Stratovarius" features no synthesizers and begins as an "ominous cloud of electronic noise" that evolves into an "acid rock jam",[1] similarly powered by the motorik groove.[11] "Megaherz" is a more subdued track, bringing "traces of ambient music", and the only one on the album to feature no drums.[1][12] Anderson describes "Vom Himmel Hoch" as a "doomy soundscape" that serves as an "aural simulation of a bombing raid", ending in an apocalyptic explosion.[1] The track has slight pitch curves that emulate the Doppler effect.[6]

Release and promotion

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Kraftwerk was released in November 1970.[13] The album cover features a drawing of a fluorescent-coloured traffic cone,[4] inspired by the works of Andy Warhol and the pop art movement.[1]

In early 1971, Hütter left the group to study architecture in Aachen,[14] leaving Schneider, drummer Dinger and newcomer guitarist Michael Rother.[15] The three-member Kraftwerk lineup of Schneider, Dinger and Rother made an appearance on Radio Bremen,[16] and also on the TV shows Beat-Club and Okidoki.[17] After this, Dinger and Rother left to form the band Neu!, with Hütter rejoining Schneider to continue Kraftwerk[14] and both parties recording under the mentoring of Conny Plank.[citation needed]

No material from this album has been performed in the band's live set since the Autobahn tour of 1975.[10] In later interviews, Schneider referred to the first three Kraftwerk albums as "archaeology", and while they have never been reissued, unauthorized releases have been widely available.[1] In 2007, Kraftwerk hinted that the album might finally see a remastered CD release after the Der Katalog boxed set.[18] Vinyl releases of the first two albums were scheduled for Record Store Day 2020 but were ultimately cancelled.[14]

"Ruckzuck" was used as the theme song for the PBS show Newton's Apple in the United States.[19] However, its use was unauthorized and the program later substituted a cover version of the song.[10]

Critical reception

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Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[7]
Sputnikmusic[12]
Treblezine6/10[8]

Praise Jimmy, reviewing Kraftwerk for the Sputnikmusic magazine, favorably compared it to the band's classic works, describing it as "remarkably human", "eager", and "organic"; largely contrasting with the "cold, robotic steel" of their classics. Jimmy also highlighted the album's slow and positively primitive approach that denies instant gratification in favor of patience, elaborating that there are "a lot of instances in which it seems like the band are noodling around, but it doesn't exactly mean they're lost" and have "eagerness" that "nothing short of charming to say the least".[12]

Treblezine' Adam Blyweiss appraised it as a "totally different kind of acquired taste than their later techno, but a fascinating listen nonetheless".[8]

In a mixed review, Ned Ragget of AllMusic felt the absence of Kraftwerk's trademark clipped keyboard melodies, but appreciated the "brilliant co-production and engineering skills" demonstrated by Conny Plank, assessing his input to be as important as the band performances. He positively singled out Hütter's organ work on the "extended opening drone moan of "Stratovarius" joined by Schneider's "eerie violin work".[7]

In 2019, Stereogum ranked the 1971 Radio Bremen version of "Ruckzuck" among twenty essential Krautrock tracks, highlighting Schneider's "ascent-descent flute intro" as "iconic" and "resembling a prototype of the opening melody of 'Trans-Europe Express'".[20] In 2020, The Guardian ranked thirty "greatest songs" recorded by Kraftwerk, placing "Ruckzuck" at the tenth spot and describing its "driving repetitive rhythms" as "almost proto-techno".[21] The same year, NME ranked Kraftwerk's debut album at the second-to-last place in the band's discography, behind Electric Café, elaborating that the album isn't "tearing up any trees in the 31st century electronica stakes, but it's still a fascinating record".[11]

Track listing

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All tracks are written by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider-Esleben.

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."Ruckzuck"7:47
2."Stratovarius"12:10
Side two
No.TitleLength
1."Megaherz"9:30
2."Vom Himmel Hoch"10:12
Total length:39:39

Personnel

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Credited adapted from LP liner notes,[22] except where otherwise noted.

Kraftwerk

Technical

  • Conrad Plank – producer, engineer
  • Klaus Löhmer – assistant
  • Ralf Hütter – cover
  • Bernhard Becher – photo
  • Hilla Becher – photo

Charts

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Weekly charts

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Chart (1971) Peak
position
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[23] 30

Year-end charts

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Chart (1971) Position
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[24] 27

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Anderson, Jason (April 2023). "02_Kraftwerk". Uncut - The Ultimate Music Guide - Kraftwerk. pp. 8–11.
  2. ^ Koch, Albert (2005). Kraftwerk (in German). Hannibal. p. 58. ISBN 978-3-85445-213-3.
  3. ^ a b c Stubbs, David (5 August 2014). Future Days: Krautrock and the Building of Modern Germany. Faber & Faber. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-571-28334-7. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  4. ^ a b c Esch 2016, p. 22.
  5. ^ a b Albiez, Sean; Pattie, David (1 January 2011). Kraftwerk: Music Non-Stop. A&C Black. p. 98. ISBN 978-1-4411-9136-6. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  6. ^ a b Smolko, Tim; Smolko, Joanna (11 May 2021). Atomic Tunes: The Cold War in American and British Popular Music. Indiana University Press. p. 148. ISBN 978-0-253-05618-4. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  7. ^ a b c Ragget, Ned. Kraftwerk at AllMusic. Retrieved 20 October 2022.
  8. ^ a b c Adam Blyweiss (2 March 2017). "Celebrate the Catalog : Kraftwerk". Treblezine. Archived from the original on 18 May 2024.
  9. ^ Adelt, Ulrich (30 August 2016). Krautrock: German Music in the Seventies. University of Michigan Press. p. 25. ISBN 978-0-472-05319-3. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  10. ^ a b c Lamb, Benjamin (14 June 2023). "Retrospective: 53 years of Kraftwerk's Kraftwerk". Mixdown. Retrieved 6 March 2025.
  11. ^ a b c Matthew Horton (6 May 2020). "Kraftwerk: Every album ranked in order of greatness". NME.
  12. ^ a b c Praise Jimmy (3 January 2017). "Kraftwerk – Kraftwerk (emeritus review)". Sputnikmusic.
  13. ^ Schütte, Uwe (27 February 2020). Kraftwerk: Future Music from Germany. Penguin UK. p. 29. ISBN 978-0-241-32055-6. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  14. ^ a b c Williamson, Nigel (April 2023). "03_Kraftwerk 2". Uncut - The Ultimate Music Guide - Kraftwerk. p. 18.
  15. ^ Thompson, Dave (1 August 2021). I Feel Love: Donna Summer, Giorgio Moroder, and How They Reinvented Music. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 41. ISBN 978-1-4930-4981-3. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  16. ^ Esch 2016, p. 29.
  17. ^ Esch 2016, p. 32.
  18. ^ Witter, Simon (2006). "Dummy Magazine - Ralf Hütter - Spring 2006". Dummy. Archived from the original on 12 February 2007. Retrieved 13 August 2023.
  19. ^ Keeley, Matt (6 May 2020). "R.I.P. Florian Schneider: 5 Best Kraftwerk Songs to Honor the Co-Founder of the Influential Electronic Group". Newsweek. Retrieved 5 March 2025.
  20. ^ Nate Patrin (13 November 2019). "20 Essential Krautrock Songs". Stereogum. Archived from the original on 19 December 2021.
  21. ^ Dave Simpson (7 May 2020). "Kraftwerk: their 30 greatest songs, ranked!". The Guardian.
  22. ^ Kraftwerk (1972). Kraftwerk (LP liner notes). Germany: Philips Records. 6305 058.
  23. ^ "Offiziellecharts.de – Kraftwerk – Kraftwerk" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts.
  24. ^ "Top 100 Album-Jahrescharts" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. 1971. Retrieved 2 April 2022.

Bibliography

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