Florian Schneider, co-founder of the highly-influential German electronic band Kraftwerk, has died at the age of 73. The band confirmed the news this morning via the following statement:
“Kraftwerk co-founder and electro pioneer Ralf Hütter has sent us the very sad news that his friend and companion over many decades. Florian Schneider has passed away from a short cancer disease just a few days after his 73rd birthday.”
“In the year 1968 Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider started their artistic and musical collaboration. In 1970 they founded their electronic Kling Klang studio in Düsseldorf and started the multi-media project Kraftwerk. All the Kraftwerk catalogue albums were conceived and produced there.”
The extent of the band's effect on the music world cannot be overstated. Often called "The Beatles of Electronic Music," Schneider and Hütter revolutionized the genre. Earlier albums utilized more traditional instrumentation (i.e. guitars, bass, drums), but later releases found the group relying more on electronics like the Minimoog and ARP Odyssey, as well as building their own homemade instruments and a custom-built vocoder.
Even their approach to recording was unique: Kraftwerk were one of the first electronic groups to experiment with tape loops and audio-tape manipulation. In 1970, they built a private recording studio named Kling Klang (named for a song on their 1972 LP Kraftwerk 2), which they regarded as more of a "laboratory" than a recording studio.
Kraftwerk's musical peers were in awe of them. On his 1977 album Low, David Bowie took a more electronic approach, influenced by Kraftwerk and their fellow German "Krautrock" bands. The influence extended to Bowie's following full-length "Heroes", which features the track "V-2 Schneider", a tribute to Florian. Afrika Bambaataa, called "The Godfather of Hip Hop", sampled Kraftwerk's 1977 song "Trans-Europe Express" for his track "Planet Rock." And their influence can be heard throughout the '80s synthpop scene and artists like Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Gary Numan, Human League, Erasure, Depeche Mode, and many more.
Schneider eventually left the band in 2008, for reasons he never divulged, but his influence continues to live on in modern music.
What I'm about to write sounds corny — let's just get it out of the way right now that I know that. I know the Kraftwerk catalog like the back of my hand, but, I have to say, despite this lifelong familiarity, seeing them live for the first time ever, and in 3-D, no less, I felt like I was experien…
Considered “The Beatles” of electronic music, Kraftwerk broke new boundaries in computerized composition when they broke into the scene in the 1970s. The German group were ahead of their time, and now, the future has finally caught up with them. Kraftwerk are currently on tour, performing their gro…
