Like its predecessor (similarly designed right down to the traffic cone cover, though green instead of red), Kraftwerk 2 has never been properly re-released, giving it the same lost-classic aura as the first album, or at least lost, period. Thankfully, bootleg reissues in 1993 restored it to wider public listening; even more so than Kraftwerk 1, its lack of official reappearance is a mystery, in that the band is clearly well on its way to the later Kraftwerk sound of fame. Stripped down to the Hütter/Schneider duo for this release, and again working with Conrad Plank as coproducer and engineer (this album alone demonstrates his ability to create performances combining technological precision and warmth), Kraftwerk here start exploring the possibilities of keyboards and electronic percussion in detail. Given that the band's drummers were gone, such a shift was already in the wind, but it's the enthusiastic grappling with drum machines and their possibilities that makes Kraftwerk 2 noteworthy. The nearly side-long effort "KlingKlang," which would later give the name to the band's studio and which predicts later lengthy efforts like "Autobahn," shows how the duo is still working toward its future styles. Steady beats are sometimes sped up and slowed down; more freeform performances on flute, violin, and keyboard remain present (rather than honing in on a core melody); and again, no vocals yet grace the recordings. On the second side, the more rock-oriented origins of the group still cling on, mostly without any percussion whatsoever: the distorted solo guitar start of "Strom," the guitar/bass duets of "Spule 4" (queasy) and "Wellenlänge" (quite beautiful and very indicative of many '90s space rock efforts). Ultimately as with Kraftwerk 1, Kraftwerk 2 isn't the "classic" sound of the band, but it's astonishingly worthy on its own, well worth seeking out. ~ Ned Raggett, All Music Guide
The album was entirely written and performed by Hütter and Schneider in late 1971, released in January 1972, with the sessions produced by the influential Konrad "Conny" Plank.
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Nobody wanted to play with us because we did all kinds of strange things… feedbacks and overtones and sounds and rhythms. No drummer wanted to work with us because we had these electronic gadgets.
Perhaps the least characteristic album of their output, it features little obvious use of synthesizers, the instrumentation being largely electric guitar, bass guitar, flute and violin. The electronics on display is generally in the realm of 1960s tape-based music more usually produced in academia, with much use of tape echo (for example the massed looping flute layers of "Strom"), reverse & altered speed tape effects. Overall the sound has a rather muted, twilit, dusky feel, similar in feel to "Megaherz" on Kraftwerk's debut album.
The lengthy, almost side-long "Kling-Klang" which opens the album is notable for its use of a preset organ beatbox to provide the percussion track. It opens with a clangourous Stockhausen-like metallic percussion montage and gives rise to the unmistakable Kraftwerk sound. Later, the song title also became the name of the band's own self-built studio, in Düsseldorf.
"Atem" is a recording of breathing, while "Harmonika" features a tape-manipulated mouth organ.
The cover design, credited to Ralf and Florian, further hints at a deliberate association with conceptualist art, being a virtual repeat of the first album's Pop Art design – except printed this time in fluorescent green and with slight modification by the number '2'.
It was eventually released in the UK, combined with the first Kraftwerk album as a double LP package, by the Vertigo label in March 1973.
No material from this album has been performed in the band's live set since the Autobahn tour of 1975, and to date, the album has not been officially reissued on compact disc. The band is seemingly reluctant to consider the release as a part of their canon; in later interviews, Schneider described the first three Kraftwerk albums as "archaeology". However, pirated CDs of the album have been widely available since the mid-1990s on the Germanofon and Crown labels. Kraftwerk has hinted that the album may finally see a re-mastered CD release after their Der Katalog box set [2].
Track listing
Side one
"Kling-Klang" ("Ring Sound", although something like "Tinkle-Tone" might capture the alliteration of the German title better) – 17:36
"Atem" ("Breath") – 2:57
Side two
"Strom" ("Stream" or "[Electric] Current" - the same wordplay as is possible in English) – 3:52
