I just made my point with the man machine concept, which is a conventional
way of interpreting
technology at the time.
Their music was not unconventional and abstract like say a Mortin Subotnick.
I don't know your age or which particular era of Kraftwerk you're
referencing (there is pre-Autobahn material), but just because it wasn't
like Subotnick doesn't mean it wasn't unconventional. I was there. It was
INDEED unconventional. There were but a very few bands which had any
notoriety doing more than dabbling with electronic stuff back then - like
Tangerine Dream and Nektar (remember them?) and NOBODY was doing what
Kraftwerk was doing, which was quite unconventional whether you were taking
the pulse of electronic music, rock music or pop music of the day. I would
go as far as saying that there probably wouldn't be a 313 list (or it would
have a different shape if there were one) had there been no Kraftwerk. We
can speculate endlessly about what might or might not have happened in
terms of someone else coming up with their sound - but nobody did and THEY
accomplished it.
And just because Juan wasn't into Kraftwerk (?) doesn't mean their
influence (which is too large to gauge, really) hadn't seeped into the
landscape sufficiently to be highly influential. Being my age, I can safely
say that their influence is incredible.
jeff
