Know Your Roots

I've known of the early days of electronic music for a long time. As I've said before, my father practically raised me on Kraftwerk cassettes and Jean Michel Jarre vinyl, and something about that old school synthesized sound just excited me. It still does in fact, which is why I'm going to drop a few early electronic classics that are essential listening for me.

Of course, we have to begin with the quintessential Krafwerk, here's a slightly lesser known number from by far their most popular, and my favourite album; The Man Machine. Oddly enough it was released in 1979, but one of their most well known hits The Model only entered the charts in 1982, thanks to being re-released as a double a-side with the next track.



This embodies what I think of when it comes to early Kraftwerk, that simple melody, the embracing of technology, all tied together with that monotone vocal delivery. A lot of the themes and elements that make up this sound are revisited around the early 2000s in Electroclash, which seems like an oxymoron; using higher tech to emulate the early electronic sound, but I do enjoy it, silly genre name and all.



Now, Giorgio Moroder. Producer extraordinaire and classy gentleman in that opening photo up there, makes a lot more upbeat stuff than the 'werk, as is to be expected of the merchant of Disco that is Giorgio Moroder. Ignoring the thinly veiled innuendos of the track titles like I Wanna Rock You on 1979's E=MC² and concentrating on the production, it's very well put together, full of that funky edge that made Moroder so famous in the first place and holds up just as well as Kraftwerk's tunes from the same year.

GiorgioMoroder · Giorgio Moroder - E=MC2 (1979)

And finally another tune courtesy of my dad. French band Space were doing their own thing too, and they gave us this track that I posted Felix Da Housecat's cover way back when. It's the earliest on the list so far, coming from 1977, I can only imagine the sounds combined with the chroma keyed up video must have been mind blowing. And just look at those wood panelled keyboards!



Energy, -Claude Van Foxbat