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Rating: We already know everything about Kraftwerk. Certainly one of the most influential bands of all time, those who brought electronic music to the masses by merging it with pop and the most catchy melodies. This might not be the best album of their career, but with this record, Kraftwerk managed to break into the market, introducing the masses to the beauty of this music. They were the flag-bearers of a musical revolution that had been brewing for years.
"Autobahn" had an immense impact. For years, free radios used this track or parts of it in jingles, nightclubs around the world used it as the evening's "peak," the myth of the man-machine began with this album.
1974. Keep that in mind when you insert the disc into your player.
Because in the 23 minutes you're about to listen to, there are all the elements of modern disco, enriched by the suite format, the beautiful progressions, the love for the avant-garde, and not least an irresistible catchiness. This, my dear friends, is a perfect piece. One of those pieces that could play endlessly. There are alternations between purely melodic moments, experimentation with filtered voices, choirs, drum-machine pulses, effects, samplings.
Only with reason can one understand that it's not improvisation, but it seems as if it is.
In the 23 minutes of delight, "Autobahn" sounds like a piece by the Grateful Dead, engaging, exhilarating.
The rest of the tracks are closer to their past albums; they don't have the commercial appeal, some have labeled them as "fillers," but they are still interesting. It's undeniable that this album is immense because of that first track that takes up the entire first side.
From there, music changed forever, just like it did for the Beatles, only that it took thirty years to be recognized.
Some criticize this album for the dance drift that electronic music soon began to take. But don't listen to them. "Autobahn" is a masterpiece, pure as spring water.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
01 Autobahn (22:43)
Wir fahr'n fahr'n fahr'n auf der Autobahn
Vor uns liegt ein weites Tal
Die Sonne scheint mit Glitzerstrahl
Die Fahrbahn ist ein graues Band
Weisse Streifen, gruener Rand
Jetzt schalten wir ja das Radio an
Aus dem Lautsprecher klingt es dann:
Wir fah'rn auf der Autobahn...
03 Kometenmelodie 2 (05:51)
Die Sonne tönt nach alter Weise
In Brudersphären Wettgesang
Und ihre vorgeschriebene Reise
Vollendet sie mit Donnerklang
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Other reviews
By Eneathedevil
"Autobahn... stands as a naive appetizer to what would become the first popular phenomenon of Kraftwerk’s production."
"Kraftwerk positioned themselves as precursors... their music is not and never would have been disco dance, but it accompanied it without involving it."
By supersantoss
It’s a must-listen, just this song alone, for the entire electronic and kraut genre of the period.
This music needs to be listened to; the sacrifice is non-existent. Stop and hear the electronic noises, so sophisticated yet so wonderfully profound.
By 123asterisco
Lightheartedness and anguish coexist. As if they were one.
From the smooth, polished, and predictably lucid journey, to cosmic, floating, gloomy disorientation without coordinates.
