Kraftwerk Entry

Kraftwerk is a german electronic band who are apparently quite popular and influential. The music is ambience tones with simple beats and incredibly repetitive melodies and vocals.
Kraftwerk released quite a few albums from 74 to 81 with the most notable probably being Autobahn. The two albums in between, Trans-Europe Express and Radio-Activity, were not met with the success of the fourth The Man-Machine. During the release of these albums some large music acts were beginning to take notice in the growing style of music this started to reflect in the later albums. As all of these were being made, the technology grew and the sound grew with it.
What really set Kraftwerk apart from bands of the time was use of technology. They decided to really use no traditional instrumentation and went strictly with all electronic types of sound. This was new simply because the technology was new. Many artists hadn't had the ability to try and use this new equipment because it wasn't available and those who knew how to use were even less available. To me this seems to be why Kraftwerk has little to no musical sound. The whole band feels like a bunch of engineers who enjoy music got together and built computers. As the albums went on this was less of the case because electronic musical instruments became easier to use.
Another piece that set Kraftwerk apart from the time was the use of a vocoder along with the vocals. Vocoders had only begun to be used as a serious instrument and hadn't been heard being used in this way. The vocoder would later become something of a trademark for the band and would inspire many following artists to use it much more interesting ways.
It's hard to know where to begin when describing how I feel about this band. I would like to start by saying that I already do not enjoy electronic music and Kraftwerk may be everything I dislike about electronic music rolled into one. The documentary required for media resource project was difficult to watch in the sense that I feel like the speakers were looking much to far into the band. They credit them as pioneers in music for doing the basic amount of work required to make music. Saying that making a drum beat that sounds like a train is innovative is like saying a child is the next Michelangelo for using multiple colors in a finger painting. Regardless of how I feel about the music, the technological advances they inspired are noteworthy. There are bands and songs that followed that may not have been made had they not pushed some of the technology they were using. Sequencers and other MIDI type software may not be where they are today without them, though I find it hard to believe no one else was playing with these things and probably making better music with it.