Neu! – Neu! '75

I myself am not really a great Neu! fan... But none the less, the influence they have had on modern day music is legendary. Why I hear some of you ask!? Well... Something I've noticed over the years, is that their name has continually been mentioned in interviews with obscure musical artists in Wire magazine!? Having clocked this odd little fact, I couldn't help wondering why... So a friend lent me this CD the other day.

Having been thoroughly immersed in its content, I subsequently listened to their other two albums, both of which are from this period. While they are all really great, for me it's this album in particular that really jumps out. Besides the fact that it contains some really well used field recordings (there's a lush recording of the sea that takes me back to Camber Sands), it vibrated on a very nostalgic note overall. Being my first port of call with Neu!'s very limited output (they released three albums in the 70s and two in the 90s), I couldn't help but notice so many similarities between the bands I had listened to in the 80s and 90s; almost like deja vu, but what an understatement. It seems that anyone I've rated as musicians or recording artists has at some point in their career/repertoire copied Neu!'s heavily effected and somewhat danceable sound...

Neu! (which is German for New!) was a German progressive band formed by Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother after they split from Kraftwerk in the early 1970s. Though the band had minimal commercial success during its existence, Neu! is retrospectively considered one of the original Krautrock bands (others being Can and Kraftwerk) that has had a significant influence on a diverse group of artists, including PiL, Joy Division, David Bowie, Stereolab, Gary Numan, Ultravox, Simple Minds, Spiritualized and The Oscillation to name but a few.

Beautifully crafted from start to finish, this release is opened with the rhythmic Isi, a number that just rolls out with light piano chords, accompanied with a stiff, simple drum rhythm leaving anyone listening helplessly tapping their feet to the rhythmication being prescribed. And it is this sort of style that Neu! became famous for... Atmospheres drenched in metronomic like rhythms with assorted uplifting/contemplative instrumentation. And I seem to totally imagine people grooving to these brooding tracks in a very German way!?

But for me Leb Wohl is the masterpiece here. Washing water on the beach opens with a nostalgic piano rift, as the sound of a clock tics into the sparse ambience of the recording, alluring consciousness to the slow age of time's steady hands as march through these dreamlike soundscapes. Nothing more than simply beautiful, it is also rather moving. I couldn't help being somewhat reminded of Primal Scream's Screamadelica and Spiritualized's Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space.

To draw on another similarity, doesn't E-Musik's drum sound really remind you of The Cure's Primary album?

While I wouldn't give it a five, it's still worth while checking out if you are into the progressive Krautrock movement back in the late 60s and early 70s... Or even if you are curious as to how this sound progressed into bands like The Cure.