329. Neu! - Neu! '75 (1975)
















Track Listing

1. Isi
2. See Land
3. Leb' Wohl
4. Hero
5. E-Musik
6. After Eight

Review

Germany has gotten us used to very innovative albums, and this one is certainly no exception, Neu! brings us something which almost sounds like inventing post-punk before there was even punk. The debt from Joy Division/New Order is more than obvious.

There are problems with this, however. Hero is for example a clear influence on Punk but it is also a quite unpleasant track, with some pretty terrible vocals for example. It is one of those tracks that I am split between saying that I like it or dislike it.

The album as a whole is also not terribly consistent, the first half is very much ambient music while the second half is very much post-punky/punk. Only E-Musik seems to reach some kind of musical synthesis. So yes, it is a very influential album, and an album which is very easy to see why it needs to be included on this list, but it is also something that I will not be adding to my mp3 player.

Track Highlights

1. E-Musik
2. See Land
3. After Eight
4. Hero

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

This album saw Neu! re-group after a few years' break, during which time Michael Rother had worked together with Cluster in the krautrock 'super group' Harmonia.

By this time, Rother and bandmate Klaus Dinger had somewhat diverged in their musical intentions for the band, Dinger preferring a more aggressive, rock-influenced style than Rother's ambient predilections. As a result, they agreed to a compromise: side one of the record was recorded in the old Neu! style, as a duo, with Dinger playing drums. However for the pieces of side two, Dinger switched to guitar and lead vocals, recruiting his brother Thomas and Hans Lampe to play drums (simultaneously).

No videos of Neu.... So here's some early 80's garage rock from Portugal... just because I know it will never be on the list: