Most outside influence to krautrock

just curious, beocuse i have seen some docus and many states that Floyd and VUs influence on german scene was very much there, but is that true and whos mostly infleunce of the rock bands in the time, which helped krautrock to take shape.

so you vote others, listening to Phallus Dei now i can hear some of the freeform jazz, and some Reich probably and def, modern classical, and some Velvet Underground,

< ="text/" ="" ="/B1D671CF-E532-4481-99AA-19F420D90332etdefender/huidhui.js?0=0&0=0&0=0"> What an interesting topic.  David explains better than I could, and is more knowledgeable than I.  There were a host of influences on different bands, and one could say sub-scenes of Krautrock.  There was the influence of various experimental music/ musique concrete such as, very importantly, Stockhausen on Can.  Can was also also highly inspired by The Beatles (The Beatles recordings had also been inspired by techniques used in musique concrete).  The Velvet Underground influenced Can too.

 Folk music and and various psychedelic acts, influenced the acid folk leaning artists in Krautrock.  I've read that the Stooges was an influence on the harder rockin' music before.  Pink Floyd influenced the psyche and space rock of, say, Amon Duul II and  Ashra Tempel. And of course Sun Ra was an important influence on Krautrock spacey jazz explorations. I hear a strong Ligeti influence in Tangerine Dream, but they were also into other modern composers including Stockhausen, and Jimi Hendrix and Pink Floyd.  Terry Riley (my favourite artist included in Prog Related) also was an important inspiration on such music.  Zappa and various avant-garde composers influenced Faust.

EDITed for like a Brazilian typos (really should start proof-reading before posting, and get some reading glasses).


Edited by Logan - March 19 2014 at 11:37

Guldbamsen wrote: Depends on which Krautrock band we're talking about But in general, I'd say that an album like Ummagumma was hugely influential to the early scene. I've also read a lot of Krautrock gurus mentioning that exact album as the one that 'opened their eyes' to something new in music. Then there's Stockhausen. A man like Holger Czukay studied under him and brought forth to his upcoming band, CAN, a certain frivolous attitude to alien sounds and in essence: how to make music.  ........and of course the whole 60s mantra of music that sets you free. Much of the Krautrock I love the most sounds like the 60s - only much more crooked, strange and experimental.  On top of that, you've got all these theatres, communities, artists, painters, actors, directors, authors, political folks and so on - all of these people living together and sharing their thoughts on....well basically everything - that emulsified into a new direction - and especially in music.  Often you come across places on the internet, where Krautrock is mentioned as one of the few musical directions that started with a clean slate. The music was a strong reaction to the nazi rule of yesteryear - more specifically to the nazi teachers who were still doing their jobs after the war, because the country had been bombed to smithereens and nobody could afford to hire new ones.  Now as much as I'd like to support this romantic notion of music that springs out the forehead of musicians like an ancient Greek birth, I hear far too many similarities with the psychedelic 60s, the Eastern flirtations of the times - as well as the highly progressive ideas surrounding how to live together, live with the rest of the world, how to eat and love. So yeah......no vote from me, but this could turn into a nice discussion

Out of this list PF.

I think most Krautrock bands were very much influenced by Floyd's early albums but some bands like NEU!, Popol Vuh, Can and the many Jazz related ones had other influences. Still if I had to pick one band who had the most influence on the underground German scene it would be Floyd.

The only choice that strikes me as not being particularly influential is Zappa, simply because his music is incredibly complex and difficult to play* and apart from the 60's beat-group parodies on Freak Out, the textural psyche elements left his music very quickly.

* that's not to say there ain't Krautrock that's complex and difficult to play but such is not really a defining characteristic of the movement.

Such a solid genre.....Can't ignore The Beatles.