Florian Schneider-Esleben — 7 April, 1947 – 21 April, 2020
Just over 40 years ago my twin brother and I were running around a small Essex town called Maldon, probably wasting time and not really focusing on anything in particular. Around 1972 my parents decided to leave London and move to a new estate about an hours drive from the East End where we had, until then being growing up. Compared to Stoke Newington the Poets estate was a giant modernist leap. Everything was planned out like a utopian dream; hundreds of small houses with design variations that were all essentially derived from the same genetic principals; clean, safe and tidy.
Back then the TV schedule was pretty limited, you marked out the days of the week by the programmes. It wasn’t Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday etc. It was Star Trek, Robinson Crusoe or Tiswas. One of my favourite evenings was Thursday: Tomorrow’s World followed by TOTPs and I’m sure something else like Star Maidens, but it’s probably a constructed memory along with all the other highlights of the seventies that in reality were probably a bit banal.
My brother and I outside our house on Poets estate in Maldon, Essex. (1972)
At the same time my dad was building up a collection of electrical gadgets that were generally referred to as Hi-fi. I liked this phrase because it sounded like Sci-fi and I guess this was just another aspect of growing up in the mid 70s and feeling like we were on the edge of the the future. We were very close to modern living even though we were just a couple of twins wearing flared jeans. I liked the Hi-fi in the corner of the living room but didn’t really get to touch any of it in case it broke as we nervously lined up the needle over the spinning vinyl.
Anyway, 70s pop music usually blasted out in the kitchen via the crunchy long wave radio signal. Not that pleasant to the ear but it did the job. All the hits from TOTPs plus more. But one evening as I strolled through to the living room as my dad was dropping the needle of the record deck onto a recent vinyl purchase, I was slightly puzzled by what I heard. Was this music or noise? It seemed to be something in between. There was rhythm, a beat and melody but I couldn’t recognise the instruments. The lyrics and voices too were slightly off, deadpan, with awkward English singing. Everyday noises could be heard in and around melodic noises. One track in particular went on and on repeating the same pattern over and over again. It sounded like a train but was definitely different to a train. Then there was section with metal drum sounds that built up towards the simulacra of a fast moving train whizzing past you and leaving that empty space I had experienced many times when trains pass through a station at high speed without stopping. It was 1978 and I had just been listening to what turned out to be Kraftwerk’s sixth studio album, Trans-Europe Express. Sci-fi meets Hi-fi. Boom. Both my brother and I were smitten by this new record. We got dad to play it over and over again. We even saved our pocket money to buy the previous albums by the German four piece and eventually managed to collect everything from Autobahn through to The Man-Machine. We were so hooked and have been ever since.
Florian Schneider, who passed away on 21st April 2020, was the co-founder of Kraftwerk along with Ralf Hütter. My brother and I saw them play live about four times. Over the years we’ve listened to and analysed lots of other musical genres but Kraftwerk have always been a high bench mark of music and conceptualism. We even did a cover version of ‘Computer Love’ in our alt-country guitar group called the Smith Garrett Band. We just couldn’t let go of the early influence Kraftwerk had over our musical journey.
Years later I asked my dad what made him buy this record? I remember Cat Stevens, Carole King, Fleetwood Mac or Santana but Kraftwerk just didn’t fit into this. He told me that he had recently watched a TV programme on train travel across Europe. Since he himself was from Yugoslavia I guess he was just observing some familiarity and seeing if his home country was part of the story. He had been so impressed with the musical soundtrack of the program but didn’t recognise this particular band. In those pre-internet — information at your fingertips age — he wrote to the BBC and they had replied with a full list of all the music included in the documentary and on that list was Kraftwerk. He bought this LP, again, not fully committing to whether he actually liked the music or whether it was just a slightly different way to experience all his Hi-fi equipment. Well either way I’m grateful. When my brother and I heard the music it turned us onto music. Not just electronic music but a huge cross section of avant-garde experimental sound.
Dad, Rick and I take over Northey Island for 5 minutes before retreating for ice cream in the park.
And now one half of this seminal band has disappeared into the ether, I feel privileged that I was able to engage in their musical journey from the late 70s to the present. And whenever life is getting too complicated, I listen to one of their songs and ponder their lyrics and I’m reminded that by ‘Pressing down a special key, it plays a little melody’ is a way of life not just a throw away pop lyric.
Life really doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.
Postscript
Florian Schneider actually left Kraftwerk in 2008 according to his wiki page. A man of few words, he did give this pithy interview with www.dazeddigital.com …
“With that in mind, a group of the world’s creative minds have teamed up for Parley for the Oceans, a campaign that aims to be a “space for creators, leaders and thinkers to come together to raise awareness for the beauty and fragility of our oceans and collaborate on projects that can end their destruction.”
Amongst those involved is Florian Schneider, the co-founder of pioneering German masterminds Kraftwerk. As part of the project, Schneider has crafted a spaced-out, electronic ode to the oceans. Packed with blips and the rush of a synthetic wave, “Stop Plastic Pollution” puts the world’s fish at the forefront.”
Read the full interview here and listen Listen to the track below:
Text © Chris Tosic, 2020
