Florian Schneider (1947 - 2020)
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on that computer world album, which i relistened to lately, what it is that is so striking is the voice, its so mournful. the only thing that comes close for me is ian curtis' voice, something like that. they don't really get credit for their voices, but they're so aching.
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woops
is not like other people
i agree up to the ian curtis bit. he always sounds like he's putting on the doom and gloom to me. there's something more detached or yes robotic about the kraftwerk german accent.
if you look at their electronic stuff there's a real divide between their happy ones and sinister ones
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Without in any way condoning this, but - German accents are slightly comical to me simply because of all the associations I picked up from movies as a kid. Especially when they play up the emotionless robot aspect. Can't help but think of Nazi doctors/bastards in Indiana Jones and so on. Or simply of emotionless efficiency.
Were Kraftwerk consciously playing with that stereotype, do you know? The nightmare image of robotic nazi supermen vs benign robots... OTOH Hitler was the polar opposite of emotionless, he was a rabid maniac, showering the stormtroopers with spit.
It's kind of interesting when you think about it, the German relationship with technology... I was going to say the nazis built the autobahn but google has shown me this is a historical fiction and in fact they were opposed to it at first:
https://www.dw.com/en/the-myth-of-hitlers-role-in-building-the-autobahn/a-16144981
Were Kraftwerk consciously playing with that stereotype, do you know? The nightmare image of robotic nazi supermen vs benign robots... OTOH Hitler was the polar opposite of emotionless, he was a rabid maniac, showering the stormtroopers with spit.
It's kind of interesting when you think about it, the German relationship with technology... I was going to say the nazis built the autobahn but google has shown me this is a historical fiction and in fact they were opposed to it at first:
https://www.dw.com/en/the-myth-of-hitlers-role-in-building-the-autobahn/a-16144981
i don't think so, they strike me in all the little bits of their voices that i've heard as pretty sincere (i've not heard a lot tbh).
but otoh, you couldn't help but be aware of the german identity as perceived at that time, they were of an age to know all about that. and so it mustve filtered in.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Nazism was something fermented in the soil of German Romanticism ... which is all about GRAND, Wagnerian emotions.
Perhaps I'm mischaracterising Nazism as machine-obsessed, then. Though of course they wanted their SS/stormtroopers to cultivate "iron hearts", and their crimes were horrifically industrial/"scientific".
Perhaps I'm mischaracterising Nazism as machine-obsessed, then. Though of course they wanted their SS/stormtroopers to cultivate "iron hearts", and their crimes were horrifically industrial/"scientific".
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Anyway, apologies for that cos a kraftwerk thread BY NO MEANS has to become a discussion about nazism :crylarf:
https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/culture/article/kraftwerk-future-music-from-germany
"Germany, in the years that followed the Second World War, found itself in something of a cultural wilderness. With the country split in two between West and East, overt expressions of nationalism were frowned upon and Anglophone music – at least in the West – began to fill the countercultural void. But as the 1970s progressed, two young men in the newly economically resurgent Rhineland, named Ralf H?tter and Florian Schneider, cast about for a new way to express German cultural identity without the impossible baggage of Nazism. As Uwe Sch?tte details in his new book, Kraftwerk: Future Music From Germany, they began by daring to include German-language lyrics in their songwriting and ended up creating an entirely new form of music: futuristic, optimistic and extremely technologically progressive. Kraftwerk was born."
https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/culture/article/kraftwerk-future-music-from-germany
"Germany, in the years that followed the Second World War, found itself in something of a cultural wilderness. With the country split in two between West and East, overt expressions of nationalism were frowned upon and Anglophone music – at least in the West – began to fill the countercultural void. But as the 1970s progressed, two young men in the newly economically resurgent Rhineland, named Ralf H?tter and Florian Schneider, cast about for a new way to express German cultural identity without the impossible baggage of Nazism. As Uwe Sch?tte details in his new book, Kraftwerk: Future Music From Germany, they began by daring to include German-language lyrics in their songwriting and ended up creating an entirely new form of music: futuristic, optimistic and extremely technologically progressive. Kraftwerk was born."
i dunno, nazism's one of those things that you probably can't boil down so easily, but perhaps you could say that kraftwerk's faith in the machine reflected post-war germany in general, in that they had lost faith in humanity, so they turned to the non human as something to hold onto. we need some germans in here to explain it.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
It's funny all these stereotypes you inherit unconsciously as a child ? like stuff about germans being the evil emotionless James bond villain.
I've been thinking about this a lot reading stuff about music from the 60s and 70s. All these references you inherit without understanding the context. Knowing a band or a singer for one song and not realising they had a lot of albums and were a big deal. Etc. Not even having heard of these celebrities who were huge back then.
I've been thinking about this a lot reading stuff about music from the 60s and 70s. All these references you inherit without understanding the context. Knowing a band or a singer for one song and not realising they had a lot of albums and were a big deal. Etc. Not even having heard of these celebrities who were huge back then.
Mellsman
Well-known member
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
Does this go into the historical background?
yyaldrin
in je ogen waait de wind
do you get the same detached or robotic effect if you listen to their songs in the original language?
Leo
Well-known member
urr...you know he committed suicide, right?