Neu!
Neu!was recorded over four days in Hamburg withCanproducer  Conrad Plank, and its static, aggressive harmonies and almost (but not  quite) robotic sound still has a resonance that echoes even today. As  any musician fromAdd N to XtoSonic Youth, fromStereolabtoCabaret Voltairecould tell you, early '70s Dusseldorf band Neu! were one third of the  original triumvirate--alongside Can andFaust--that defined Krautrock. Michael Rother (guitar/keyboards) and Klaus Dinger (drums) formed the band in 1971, and with their first three albums established  a pattern of minimalist melodies and locked groove "motorik" beats that  were to later exert a tremendous influence over left-field music, both  in dance and rock. Indeed, one of the great U.S. avant-garde '90s bands,Negativland, take  their name from a track on this album. "Hallogallo, Sonderangebot," "Im  Gluck"--these are the conveyor-belt grooves, the elemental sweep and  soar of the neon-bright autobahn, and the sound of the future when it was  still shiny and clean. AsDavid Bowieput it,  "[Neu! were] Kraftwerk's wayward, anarchistic brothers." And so much  more.--Jerry Thackray