Kraftwerk

Quora Answer : Which music artist had the biggest influence on your generation?

Nov 11, 2015

I'm basically an electronic music fan. And consider that's my "generation".

So probably I'd have to say Kraftwerk.

Just remind yourself again ... this record came out only 7 years after Sgt. Pepper. It's more or less contemporary with Glam Rock, with Bowie and Queen, with Led Zeppelin, and the invention of Heavy Metal. It predates Disco.

And yet it's just announced that rock music is "over". It's thrown away the format of amplified guitar, bass and drum kit in favour of almost nothing but electronics. It's thrown out the blues in favour of an extremely simplified neo-classical harmonic framework. It's thrown out music driven by chord progressions in favour of counterpoint between several monophonic lines. It's thrown out overtly emotional singing in favour of vocoders and rather drab emotionless muttering. It's thrown out earnestness in favour of irony. (Seriously? It's "fun" on the autobahn? Do we sound like we're having fun?) It's thrown out virtuoso musicianship in favour of just letting a machine tick along (and requiring humans fit in with that.)

In other words, you know those people who write Quora questions along the lines of "Why has music got so bad since my favourite rockers of the late 60s / early 70s?". You've seen those people around, right? Well, everything those people HATE about modern popular music : machines, dancing, a classical / minimal rather than romantic / folkloric spirit. It ALL started with this record. And then proceded to dominate popular music for the next 40 years.

More or less every strand in contemporary rhythmic / dancable / pop electronic-music, passes through Kraftwerk.

Hip-hop :

House and Techno.

Electro Pop ... from the preppiest early 80s synth-pop

to gothy darkwave

and I could go on ... but pretty much everything in modern popular music is rooted int the electronic composition style pioneered by Kraftwerk.