In this video we're going to examine rhythms
from the golden era of Kraftwerk - the German pioneers of electronic music. And you know what that means. I need to put on a red shirt... Speak with ein very heavy German accent - ja
- and make even more robotic movements than usual. Wunderbar! (The Intern) Yeah... we're not going to do that. Ugh. Okay But you're going to accompany me on synthesizers. I'll take that as a yes. Hello everyone, this is... We start our journey in 1974 with "Autobahn". On
this album Kraftwerk started to leave their
psychedelic Krautrock roots behind and ditched the acoustic drums in favour of artificial
electronic sounds. In his book "I was a Robot", Wolfgang Flür
- one of Kraftwerk's drummers - describes how he and Florian Schneider made their own
electronic drum kit back in the day. They had one of these preset rhythm machines
that were made to accompany organ players. And while there were buttons on there to trigger
the individual sounds - just like here on th
e DRM-1 - that's not really comfortable
to perform entire songs with. So instead they opened up the thing and rewired
the button contacts to two metal sticks and a series of metal discs. That works pretty much like this Stylophone:
Whenever the metal tip of the stylus touches a metal pad, a circuit is closed and the corresponding
sound is triggered. The downside is that this is an on or off
type situation - you won't get any dynamics or loudness variation from this. So this already gives us two
important ingredients
to the Kraftwerk signature sound: We need to stay the hell away from velocities and
accents... (The Intern) Especially German accents! Right. And we need a drum machine with really dusty
old sounds. The TT-78 is a relatively new drum machine,
but it was inspired by the venerable Roland CR-78. Its sonic character should be similar enough
to these antique preset rhythm boxes, so let's give it a try. Mmmh - bone-dry and dusty. Lovely. Let's program the main rhythm for "Autobah
n". I'll use the Deluge as a sequencer though. This way you'll have a better overview of
the different instruments. Kick... Snare... And that's it. Except for one tiny little detail: Autobahn
has swing. And that's actually pretty unusual for Kraftwerk
songs. The swing only affects this single Snare hit
though, because it's the only drum hit on an even step. Makes the rhythm a lot more bouncy and cheerful,
doesn't it? Can't have that if you want to be a cold hearted
robot. There's even a tiny bit
of variation: Occasionally
there will be a Snare hit here on the last step. Oh and what's really fun: There's an upbeat
on this track that sounds kind of like starting a motor. While the main rhythm feels pretty lighthearted,
the middle part ditches the swing and picks up the pace. If you want to stay within the subject of
the Autobahn you could say we're stepping on the gas pedal. Add some noisy Hi-Hats... Delay... And a wild sound collage of synthesizers
imitating traffic noises. That's a pre
tty elaborate drum track compared
to later Kraftwerk productions. By the way, you can find the transcriptions
of all drum patterns used in this video and lots more on our Patreon. 1975's "Radio-Activity". Ooh, ambiguous title alert: The songs are
either about radio broadcasting (Radio-Activity) or the atomic age (Radioactivity). Get it? And Kraftwerk means "power plant" in German. It's all coming together. Some of Kraftwerk's percussion sounds were
created using synthesizers, not drum machines o
r modified rhythm machines. I don't want to build every sound from scratch
though, so I'll use the DRM-1, which is a drum synthesizer with plenty of parameters
and sonic weirdness. We actually only need 8 steps for "Radioactivity". Very economic. It starts with a simple four on the floor
Kick drum. Pan it all the way to the right. This one is removed right before the intro
ends. Here's where things get interesting. That right kick now always plays on the first
step... and it gets a counterpart:
a second Kick drum that's panned all the way to the
left. Feels a bit like a beating heart. The Hi-Hat is panned hard left and the Cymbal
hard right. In the middle of the song a morse code is
introduced. That's also when the drums get busier. Fill up the left Kick and the Hi-Hats... and
do a few variations on the left Kick. The year is 1977. Since making an album about the Autobahn - Germany's
motor highway system - worked so well, why not tackle an even larger scale transportation
system: The E
uropean international network of express trains. This is a fun one. Trans-Europe Express consists of two separate
rhythms layered on top of each other. The first one is made out of three noisy,
percussive sounds. Essentially these are just noise generators
with an amp and filter envelope. We need a short noisy sound... another one that's slightly brighter... and
a third softer sound that provides the glue. You probably already noticed it, but this
rhythm sounds very much like a train. Okay, more
like a steam train and not like
a modern express train, but nonetheless. And I guess that makes it official: Kraftwerk
really have a knack for... Musical Ono-mato-poe... yah. Onomato-po-ey-ah. Onomatopee-a. That can't be right. Oh, it is? Musical Onomatopoeia. It's when music imitates or mimics a sound. Like a starting motor, car horns - or a train. Great. Now let's add the second rhythm on top of
this. Kick and Snare. And that's it. This goes on for the entire rest of the song. Like a veeery l
ong train ride. But wait... Trans-Europe Express has something we could
call a drum break! Breaks and fills are pretty rare in Kraftwerk
songs though. If you do find them, they are incredibly restrained
and understated. Kraftwerk drummer Wolfgang Flür called this
one of his strengths. He says flashy complicated drums were never
his style, though admittedly also due to his lack in formal training. And this became part of Kraftwerk's signature
sound: The drums never distract from the other element
s of the song. By the way: This steam train drum pattern
is not used in one but three different tracks on the album. That's not only minimalism, but also minimal
effort. Very nice. Speaking of minimalism: In that regard the
song "Hall of Mirrors" takes the cake. It's just one percussive sound repeating hypnotically
like a metronome throughout the entire song. Sounds like slow footsteps in a big hall. Simple, yet effective. Could be a needle impulse sent through a spring
reverb or maybe even some
one banging on reverb springs. 1978's "The Man-Machine" is often called Kraftwerk's
pop album. By now they had perfected their melody driven
minimalism. According to Kraftwerk member Karl Bartos
this was the first album on which they were able to sync the drums with the sequencer. Finally, the human element is out of the equation. Sequenced drums for everyone! "The Model" is one of the best examples of
Kraftwerk's minimalism. Just Kick and Snare. Repeat for four bars and at the end of the
fourth
bar add another snare hit right here. On special occasions make that three Snare
hits. It should come as no surprise to you that
this simplicity and minimalism is something all classic Kraftwerk songs have in common. It's one of the defining characteristics of
their music - whether it's melody, rhythm or even the lyrics. As long as it serves the song, "Less is more"
and "repetition" are their guiding principles. And there's no arguing that these mechanical
rhythms and futuristic sounds go extre
mely well together. On "The Man-Machine" Kraftwerk obviously had
a new favourite sound design trick. On some tracks the bassline is so percussive
that you really have to see it as part of the drums. They did this by dialing in very snappy filter
and amp envelopes. Kraftwerk used a Minimoog for most of their
basslines. That one gets snappy enough on its own, but
if your synth needs some help you can just layer some clicks on top of the bass notes. You can hear this kind of bassline on "Spacelab"
for example. Let's quickly whip up the drums. Again just Kick and Snare, that's it. Watch me program a few variations during the song. How can you possibly follow up an album like
"The Man-Machine"? After an unusually long time of three years,
Kraftwerk returned with 1981's "Computer World" - a concept album about our modern computerized
lives. There are a few gems on here, among them one
of my favourite songs - "Computer Love". It's really hard to describe what the appeal
of Kraftwerk's songs i
s, but I think the Icelandic musician Björk put it best when she said:
"Kraftwerk's music is very cold... but also very very warm." Let's build the main rhythm of "Computer Love". Next is a nice Open and Closed Hi-Hat pattern. And one final touch at the end: Claves and
Cymbal. Now we just have to add some variation to
the Kick drum. Later the rhythm gets busier and transitions
into almost skipping or galloping. That's also when the lead synth playfully
strays from that wonderful leitmotiv from t
he first half of the track. Let's try an experiment. What if we play this exact same rhythm with
808 sounds? Reminds you a bit of the old electro classics
like "Planet Rock", doesn't it? Minus the cowbell of course. And that's actually not a coincidence. Afrika Bambaata said he wanted to make music
like Kraftwerk. "Planet Rock" was released the year after
"Computer Love" came out and even prominently features a sample of Kraftwerk's "Trans-Europe
Express". It's the same with The Egyptian Lover's
"Egypt Egypt": The intro samples Kraftwerk's "Tour de France"... and the rhythm sounds like it
was taken right off the "Computer World" album - including the laser clicky sync trigger
sound. And let's be honest, "Numbers" with its detuned
synth line could easily be mistaken for an Aphex Twin song from the Syro era. And listen to this... Really, Phil? Kraftwerk had a huge impact on electronic
music - their name pops up surprisingly often whenever musicians talk about their influences. Just recen
tly I watched an interview with
Rick Rubin and Pharrell Williams where they discussed their first memories of hip-hop
- and they both agreed that it was Kraftwerk. What I really love about Kraftwerk is how
they experimented with their sounds - they are unapologetically synthetic. They never try to conceal the fact that the
sounds are artificial - they celebrate it. Some of these could even be straight out of
a 1960's science-fiction movie. Come on, you didn't think we were going to
skip this one
? A big shoutout to all of our Patrons. Thanks to your support, we can keep making
these videos.
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