Kraftwerk. Future Music from Germany

After its defeat in the Second World War, Germany’s identification with the idea of Europe provided a way out of the moral and political disrepute into which it had fallen. The country was eager to show that it no longer aspired to supremacy but instead to cooperation — peace rather than war and territorial expansion. Kraftwerk are a case in point for this German trait; their 1977 album, Trans-Europe Express, which celebrates trans-European train travel and cultural exchange, is the clearest indicator of the inherent European identity that defines the work of the band and the attitudes of the polylingual Hütter and Schneider.