Introduce me to Krautrock

 

 

 

 

       My favorite krautrock band is an obscure one, German Oak. Though mainly instrumental, kind of in the vein of Amon Duul 2, but I like German Oak more.

Welcome ... thanks for posting.

There is a side of "krautrock" that is unusual, which I think helped it come alive. Language is one of them and an important part of the process that created "krautrock" with its improvisations.

It's "name" was created by an English Press. The other situation is that the main audience for many of these bands was somewhere else, as it was well known and understood that German musical companies did not care much for their own bands. There are many articles on this, in many books. Essentially, I think that many of these bands knew that they had to sing in English if they wanted to get past their bar status, for lack of a better term for them. Or at least have a slight chance to get an inch of dollar bills from America ... the golden rainbow in all of this for anyone that could get there (... not really ... but .... dreams are hard to dispel!).

There are a few things that are in German, and some have been mentioned. I would like to add the band NOVALIS, however the sad side of it, and I still have those albums, is that for most of us, what is being said is kinda lost, even if you know the philosophy a bit by looking up Wiki or similar. I felt empty ... came away with a pair of nice albums, and had no idea what it was they were really about.

The other is, that "krautrock", essentially, despite its various different stages and areas of livelihood (David Stubbs' Future Days is recommended reading!), was a lot less about the language, than it was about something else ... and that something else probably had a little similarity to some film, theater and writing, and other arts, for which "krautrock" offered many folks experimenting and doing bizarre things on stage ... some do not like the crazy guitar sounds that Ax Gernrich created for Guru Guru, but they were not the only guitarist doing that kind of stuff ... there were many others in Berlin, also performing, solo or otherwise, and eventually they gave way to things like Neu and Kraftwerk, and then ... you geet Faust.

The hard thing to tell a rock audience, and sometimes the comments here are strictly about rock music, and are not connected to the other arts or the contemporaries, friends, and relations to many of these folks ... and this is scary to me, when you become aware of a lot of German Theater and Film, that really was much more "independent" and different, within the world market, and some of it had more in common with the early side of "krautrock" than we allow them to have credit for.

I like to ask folks if they think that the improvisations by Damo Suzuki are any different than those by Klaus Kinski. And the answer is NO. One was recorded with a camera, and the other was recorded with a microphone ... but sadly, a lot of the early German film was only seen in Film Festivals, and not many folks, do not know Herzog, from Wenders, from Fassbinder, all of which are/were extremelly well known for open camera shooting and parts of their story with no script ... there is a joke in England that Mike Leigh likes to allow his actors to "die" with no script and notes ... guess what Fassbinder had done before, and then Herzog ... all of which had been done for at least 10 years in France, by Godard.

Introducing you to this, is not easy. I would like to make some suggestions, but telling you to go listen to Phallus Dei, is not as valuable and interesting a concept as it is knowing that they had just split a large commune, and that this particular piece is quite obviously a comment about the commune. You get stoned, you have sex and then party some more. It is also hard to see how/what Faust did, in their very early albums, which you and I would consider kid stuff and just crazy/stoned fun ... and who cares what it meant. The same thing was happening in theater at least with one writer (Handke) that was writing "word" plays, with no sentences, no meanings and no "communication" as we know it, and yet, directed correctly that actually works, despite it just being a one act play or two.

The experimentation is what all this is about ... and it was that spirit which brought out the incredible amount of arts that it did ... sadly we only think of rock music, and not all the other arts that were/are around it, and the rock press is not capable/willing to do this ... a Can fanboy (so to speak -- not meant to sound bad), is not going to see 4 Herzog films (ohh my God, what is Popol Vuh doing here?), 3 Wenders films or 2 Fassbinder films, let alone go to the theater to see a Handkle play, or a Weiss play (even though his fame came in England!) ... or some others that were experimenting with voice in theatrical circles.

It's hard to believe that a rock listening audience would never see/care for any of this ... it's a part of the culture and what helped create it ... and it should not be left behind. But saying that Guru Guru (just as an example) was inspired by Chuck Berry or some one else ... really fails to hit the biggest mark about what that band was about, and its many political rallies against the divided Germany ... something that we grossly ignore and avoid like another brick in the wall!

All of these suggestions are magnificent ... and I want to add a different/odd one that is  definitely a wonderful example of how some of these folks lived, and played and were different many times. There is a remastered version of "Solar Music Live" and in it there are several versions of the same piece, and while the "theme" is the same, the thing is actually different and still enjoyable to no one. 

In many ways, this is what "krautrock" was about ... the problem being that a top ten listener will likely not handle it, because it changes too much and is too weird and does not follow the well known status that the public, seemingly (including here) demands time and time again ... just remember ... "krautrock" is not about a SOUND, or a guitar, or this or that ... it is a very specific experimental mood with a great desire ... to be FREE ... of musical constraints.

I think that the most important part of it, is to make sure the guy knows that a lot of this stuff, in those days, was improvised and its survival, shows that there is a magnificent and extremely valuable content in music in the improvised areas, something that the "progressive" definition, tends to confuse with "solo" ... in "krautrock" it would not qualify as a "solo" (in my seeing it), because it is a bridge to a new section, or an extension of the current section, and not something that brings you back to the "main part" of the song ... in general, it is safe to say that all these have a tendency to continue and never stop.

I would also add Guru Guru, in their first 5 albums ... their stuff all the way to "Dance of the Flames" is outstanding, and the earlier part with Ax Genrich is even better and some of the most far out guitar madness ever recorded ... that many folks (sometimes) might not enjoy because it tears apart at the fabric of a "song". And all you drummers, listen to how Mani adjusts ... you can't teach that kind of listening.