Artist:Kraftwerk
Song:Autobahn
Album:Autobahn
Today electronic keyboards are as common as guitar, bass and drums. They started appearing on albums in the 60s like Walter Carlos' Switched On Bach and especially Ron Grainer's music for the British TV show Doctor Who. But we didn't see it much on the pop charts until the 70s. It started in Europe especially in Germany. But Kraftwerk was the first serious electronic music act to make an impact on pop music with the 1974 single Autobahn. I'm not including novelty songs that used synthesizers. This was mostly due to Philips Records promotion guys convincing radio stations to play Autobahn. Kraftwerk was formed in 1970 in Dusseldorf, Germany by Florian Schneider and Ralf Hutter. They were students at Dusseldorf's Robert Schumann Hochschule. They wanted to make experimental music. They were in the band Organisation who released the 1970 album Tone Float on RCA in Germany. The album didn't sell but Schneider and Hutter decided to ditch the band and record as the duo Kraftwerk. They both played synthesizers. They sometimes played other instruments and additional instruments. It took them a few years to figure things out. I knew about this kind of music already as there was a store in the Cumberland Center in Toronto that sold German electronic music bands like Can and I bought albums there. I got to listen to them in the store. Someone needed to figure out how to commercialize this music. And that brings me to Autobahn. First, the album Autobahn was more pop than their early albums. It was the first album to be released in the US by Philips. The big problem was the title song was 22 minutes long. They worked up a three minute single and sent it to radio station. They even produced a video. The strategy worked as Autobahn reached #11 on the British Singles chart and #25 on the Billboard Hot 100. It charted worldwide. The success of Autobahn was very influential in that it showed that electronic music could sell if marketed properly. This album is available in a remastered version. It was Kraftwerk's biggest hit. They still record and tour. Henning Schmitz replaced Schneider in 2008. Schneider died in 2020. In 2025, Kraftwerk did a multimedia tour with skateboarder Tony Hawk. They will tour Asia in the spring. Though Kraftwerk last released new music in 2003, they released a live album in 2017. Whether or not you like Kraftwerk, they certainly changed the perception of electronic music. Here's the video for Autobahn by Kraftwerk.
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