I'm sooooo green: The Beginner's Guide to Krautrock

Kraftwerk

Though having released hardly any new work in nearly three decades, Ralf Hütter plus three session robots still gig as Kraftwerk, currently touring Europe playing the same set in 3D complete with glasses for the audience.

Showroom dummies? Hütter and his henchmen perform in 2012

Herr Hütter, who is quoted in Future Days as saying: “Mr Adolf from Austria” made Germany wary of a “cult of personality” now seems to run Kraftwerk as a kind of totalitarian de-personality cult.

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Neu!

The great trilogy of Neu!, Neu 2 and Neu 75 have finally found a home on Grönland records after years of bootlegging and unavailability. Don’t bother with any of Klaus Dinger’s shambolic later incarnations of the Neu! moniker, though do bother with the two bands the members of Neu! formed afterwards.

Klaus Dinger’s first three La Dusseldorf albums La Dusseldorf, Viva and Individuellos are a blast, as are both Michael Rother + Cluster’s two original Harmonia albums: Harmonia and De Luxe. La Dusseldorf and Harmonia are only available in the UK on import at the moment via Warners and Universal respectively.

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Tangerine Dream

Tangerine Dream’s best moments are decidedly in the past, though they live on. Alpha Centauri, Zeit and Atem are the business for kraut purists, though the following few sequencer albums are not without their charms.

There were a few good soundtracks in the 1980s but not much interesting of late. If you're keen to hear how the Dream lives on, the latest touring line-up of Edgar Froese, Ulrich Schnauss, Thorsten Quaeschning and Hoshiko Yamane has very recently released Mala Kunia, a seven-track EP as a taster for a CD/vinyl release this spring.

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Manuel Göttsching, Klaus Schulze, Ashra and The Cosmic Jokers

Klaus Schulze is still locked away in his Schloss making ambient Wagnerian epics. Manuel Göttsching still occasionally plays as himself and with Ashra. Both are generally considered to have completed their best work in the classic era of Krautrock.

Here are my faves amongst the sometimes confusing early oeuvre of Messrs Göttsching & Schulze. Most of these were reissued on CD via Spalax Records, but some are getting to be rare and occasionally stupidly priced, the best place to start looking is on the artist’s sites:

• Klaus Schulze – Irrlicht
• Ashra – New Age of Earth
• Ashra – Blackouts
• The Cosmic Jokers – The Cosmic Jokers
• The Cosmic Jokers – Galactic Supermarket

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