AV Club's Gateway to Geekery: Krautrock

June 22nd, 2009

Old news, I know, but I had to mention that The Onion’s AV Club launched a new feature back in February called “Gateway to Geekery” and it covered Krautrock back in March.

The gist of krautrock is simple: It was Germany’s answer to the musical upheaval at play all across the planet in the late 1960s and ’70s, when rock did double-duty as revolutionary art-music and strived to be newly psychedelic and free. As befits countless German stereotypes, though, krautrock’s roots grew as much from early avant-garde electronic musicians like Karlheinz Stockhausen as from, say, The Beatles and The Velvet Underground. From those electronic roots grew all sorts of unusual modes, noises, and textures, which in turn proved influential in the evolution of later electronic sounds like ambient and techno (and, in less rewarding instances, that nasty bugaboo known as new-age).

I’ve got a Can show or two somewhere as well as one by Ash Ra Temple so I’ll have to post my very first Krautrock podcast soon.

Andy Battaglia of the AV Club suggests Can’s Tago Mago as a starting point. Personally I’m more inclined to suggest their first album, Monster Movie. And I was surprised that he didn’t mention Tangerine Dream.

Hopefully a future installment of Gateway to Geekery will cover RIO (Rock in Opposition). Do you tell a newbie to listen to Henry Cow first or Univers Zero?

Related posts:

1. Giant Brain
2. Show #29: Rhythm'n'Jews – "Between Heaven and Earth" (Part 1)