[
]
Collaboration with Eno: 1976
After the release of ''Deluxe'', Harmonia went back to touring until Roedelius, Moebius and Rother ended their collaboration in summer 1976. All three members started solo projects but rejoined as Harmonia in September 1976 when Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...
visited them in Forst for 11 days, living and recording with Harmonia before proceeding to collaborate with David Bowie
David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...
on his 1977 albums. Eno brought along a four-track recorder and a VCS3
The VCS 3 (or VCS3; an initialism for ''Voltage Controlled Studio, version #3'') is a portable analog synthesizer with a flexible modular voice architecture introduced by Electronic Music Studios (London) Limited (EMS) in 1969.
EMS release ...
synthesizer.[ The material for '']Tracks and Traces
''Tracks and Traces'' is a collaborative album by German kosmische supergroup Harmonia (featuring Neu! guitarist Michael Rother and Cluster members Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius) and British musician Brian Eno, initially credited to H ...
'' was not released until 1997 because the tapes were long considered lost.
Eno has stated that Harmonia was "the world's most important rock band" in the mid '70s, Eno had joined Harmonia once live in 1974, jamming with the group at The Fabrik in Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
, timezone1 = Central (CET)
, utc_offset1 = +1
, timezone1_DST = Central (CEST)
, utc_offset1_DST = +2
, postal ...
. David Bowie
David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...
considered Harmonia one of the most important and influential German bands of the era.[
]
Reformation: 2007-2009
Harmonia reunited in 2007 following the release of their album ''Live 1974
''Live 1974'' is the only live album released by the highly influential krautrock group Harmonia. It was recorded live in concert on 23 March 1974 at Penny Station in Griessem, Germany. The live album was released in 2007 by Grönland Records. ...
'', a recording of their concert of 23 March 1974 at Penny Station Club in Griessem, Germany. Rother, Roedelius and Moebius performed live as Harmonia for the first time since 1976, opening the Worldtronics Festival at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
on 27 November 2007.
Musician, writer, and rock historian Julian Cope
Julian David Cope (born 21 October 1957) is an English musician and author. He was the singer and songwriter in Liverpool post-punk band the Teardrop Explodes and has followed a solo career since 1983 in addition to working on musical side proj ...
places both albums in his Krautrock Top 50. The trio also toured and a new recording drawn from this period, ''Live 1974
''Live 1974'' is the only live album released by the highly influential krautrock group Harmonia. It was recorded live in concert on 23 March 1974 at Penny Station in Griessem, Germany. The live album was released in 2007 by Grönland Records. ...
'' was released on the UK-based Grönland Records
Grönland Records is a British–German independent record label founded in London, England, which relocated to Berlin in 2009. "Grönland" (German for Greenland) refers both to the country, the label's founder, Herbert Grönemeyer and the epo ...
label on 22 October 2007 and the San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
based Water Records label in the United States on 11 December 2007.
Harmonia made their first live appearance in the UK on 18 April 2008, playing on the opening night of the Ether Festival
In organic chemistry, ethers are a class of compounds that contain an ether group—an oxygen atom connected to two alkyl or aryl groups. They have the general formula , where R and R′ represent the alkyl or aryl groups. Ethers can again be ...
in the Queen Elizabeth Hall
The Queen Elizabeth Hall (QEH) is a music venue on the South Bank in London, England, that hosts classical, jazz, and avant-garde music, talks and dance performances. It was opened in 1967, with a concert conducted by Benjamin Britten.
The ...
at Southbank Centre
Southbank Centre is a complex of artistic venues in London, England, on the South Bank of the River Thames (between Hungerford Bridge and Waterloo Bridge).
It comprises three main performance venues (the Royal Festival Hall including the Nat ...
, London. In July 2008, the band also headlined the final day of the Supersonic Festival in Birmingham.
Harmonia further appeared at the All Tomorrow's Parties
"All Tomorrow's Parties" is a song by the Velvet Underground and Nico, written by Lou Reed and released on the group's 1967 debut studio album, ''The Velvet Underground & Nico''.
Inspiration for the song came from Reed's observation of Andy Warh ...
music festival in the UK in May 2008, at the Numusic festival in Stavanger, Norway, at an edition of ATP curated by My Bloody Valentine in New York in September 2008 and at the Australian series of the festival, curated by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian rock music, rock band formed in 1983 by vocalist Nick Cave, multi-instrumentalist Mick Harvey and guitarist-vocalist Blixa Bargeld. The band has featured international personnel throughout its care ...
in January 2009.
In September 2009, an extended version of ''Tracks and Traces
''Tracks and Traces'' is a collaborative album by German kosmische supergroup Harmonia (featuring Neu! guitarist Michael Rother and Cluster members Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius) and British musician Brian Eno, initially credited to H ...
'' was released by Gronland. The new album features three additional tracks from the Harmonia & Eno ´76 collaboration. ''Tracks and Traces Remixed'', an album composed of remixes followed in 2010.
Dieter Moebius
Dieter Moebius (16 January 1944 – 20 July 2015) was a Swiss-born German electronic musician and composer, best known as a member of the influential krautrock bands Cluster and Harmonia.
Moebius was studying art at Berlin's Akademie Grafik and ...
died in July 2015.
In October 2015, Grönland Records released the 6-disc vinyl boxset ''Complete Works''. The box included all three studio albums, ''Live 1974
''Live 1974'' is the only live album released by the highly influential krautrock group Harmonia. It was recorded live in concert on 23 March 1974 at Penny Station in Griessem, Germany. The live album was released in 2007 by Grönland Records. ...
'' and ''Documents 1975''; a collection of 2 live tracks and 2 early versions of ''Deluxe'' LP album tracks. ''Documents 1975'' was released as a separate CD and vinyl-LP in March 2016. ''Documents 1975'' had been released as a cassette prior to the ''Complete Works'' boxset in September 2015.
Style and influence
According to AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...
, the work of Harmonia was borne out of "relaxed, improvisational jam sessions that wedded Cluster's exploratory space music
Space music, also called spacemusic or space ambient, is a subgenre of new-age music and is described as "tranquil, hypnotic and moving". It is derived from ambient music and is associated with lounge music, easy listening, and elevator music.
...
with the chugging rhythms and guitar sense of Rother." ''Uncut
Uncut may refer to:
* ''Uncut'' (film), a 1997 Canadian docudrama film by John Greyson about censorship
* ''Uncut'' (magazine), a monthly British magazine with a focus on music, which began publishing in May 1997
* '' BET: Uncut'', a Black Enter ...
'' named their two studio albums as "among the best Krautrock had to offer, gentler than Can or Faust
Faust is the protagonist of a classic German legend based on the historical Johann Georg Faust ( 1480–1540).
The erudite Faust is highly successful yet dissatisfied with his life, which leads him to make a pact with the Devil at a crossroads ...
, but with their shimmering keyboards and mechanical rhythms, every bit as compelling. ''Pitchfork
A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves.
The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to th ...
'' labeled them "a key krautrock band because they brought together the most familiar strands of the sound and effectively perfected the whole," calling attention to their hybrid of electronic
Electronic may refer to:
*Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor
* ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal
*Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device
*Electronic co ...
and rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
instrumentation, long-form structures, and steady rhythms.
According to ''Pitchfork'', "copies of their records found their way into some famously open-eared and influential fans in the UK—Brian Eno and David Bowie, among others—and Harmonia’s music has been part of the experimental rock
Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments with the basic elements of the genre. Artists aim to liberate and innovate, with ...
canon ever since." Harmonia continued to influence Brian Eno's work after their collaboration. Their work, according to critic Alex Abramovich, helped to lay the foundation "not only for ambient music but for generations of blues-less rock bands, from Wire
Overhead power cabling. The conductor consists of seven strands of steel (centre, high tensile strength), surrounded by four outer layers of aluminium (high conductivity). Sample diameter 40 mm
A wire is a flexible strand of metal.
Wire is c ...
and New Order to My Bloody Valentine."[
]
Members
* Michael Rother
Michael Rother (born 2 September 1950) is a German experimental musician, best known for being a founding member of the influential bands Neu! and Harmonia (band), Harmonia, and an early member of the band Kraftwerk.
Early life and educatio ...
(1973–1976, 2007–2009)
* Hans-Joachim Roedelius
Hans-Joachim Roedelius (born 26 October 1934) is a German electronic musician and composer, best known as a co-founder of the influential 'kosmische' groups Cluster and Harmonia. He also performed in the ambient jazz trio Aquarello, and relea ...
(1973–1976, 2007–2009)
* Dieter Moebius
Dieter Moebius (16 January 1944 – 20 July 2015) was a Swiss-born German electronic musician and composer, best known as a member of the influential krautrock bands Cluster and Harmonia.
Moebius was studying art at Berlin's Akademie Grafik and ...
(1973–1976, 2007–2009)
* Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...
(1976)
* Mani Neumeier
Mani Neumeier (Manfred Neumeier, born 31 December 1940 in Munich) is a German rock musician, free-jazz drummer, artist, and frontman (singer and drummer) of the German Krautrock-band Guru Guru.
Probably best known for his work with Guru Guru, Neu ...
– drums (1975)
Discography
;Studio albums
*1974 ''Musik von Harmonia
''Musik von Harmonia'' is the debut album from the influential German krautrock group Harmonia, released in January 1974 by Brain Records. Formed by the addition of Neu! guitarist Michael Rother to Cluster (the duo of Hans-Joachim Roedelius and ...
''
*1975 '' Deluxe''
*1997 ''Tracks and Traces
''Tracks and Traces'' is a collaborative album by German kosmische supergroup Harmonia (featuring Neu! guitarist Michael Rother and Cluster members Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius) and British musician Brian Eno, initially credited to H ...
'' (as Harmonia '76, in 2009 as Harmonia & Eno '76)
;Compilation and live albums
*2007 ''Live 1974
''Live 1974'' is the only live album released by the highly influential krautrock group Harmonia. It was recorded live in concert on 23 March 1974 at Penny Station in Griessem, Germany. The live album was released in 2007 by Grönland Records. ...
''
*2010 '' Tracks and Traces Remixed'' (as Harmonia & Eno '76)
*2015 ''Documents 1975''
*2015/2020 ''Complete Works'' (box set)
;Singles
*1975 "De Luxe (Immer Wieder)"/"Monza (Rauf Und Runter)"
See also
* Brian Eno
Brian Peter George St John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (; born Brian Peter George Eno, 15 May 1948) is a British musician, composer, record producer and visual artist best known for his contributions to ambient music and work in rock, pop an ...
* Cluster
may refer to:
Science and technology Astronomy
* Cluster (spacecraft), constellation of four European Space Agency spacecraft
* Asteroid cluster, a small asteroid family
* Cluster II (spacecraft), a European Space Agency mission to study t ...
* Dieter Moebius
Dieter Moebius (16 January 1944 – 20 July 2015) was a Swiss-born German electronic musician and composer, best known as a member of the influential krautrock bands Cluster and Harmonia.
Moebius was studying art at Berlin's Akademie Grafik and ...
* German rock
German rock music (''Deutschrock'') came into its own only by the late 1960s, but spawned many bands spanning genres such as krautrock, Neue Deutsche Welle, heavy metal, punk, and industrial.
Rock and roll itself arose in the United States in t ...
* Hans-Joachim Roedelius
Hans-Joachim Roedelius (born 26 October 1934) is a German electronic musician and composer, best known as a co-founder of the influential 'kosmische' groups Cluster and Harmonia. He also performed in the ambient jazz trio Aquarello, and relea ...
* Kluster
Kluster was a Berlin-based German experimental musical group formed in 1969 by Hans-Joachim Roedelius, Conrad Schnitzler, and Dieter Moebius. Their improvisational work presaged later industrial music. The original Kluster was short-lived, exist ...
* Kraftwerk
Kraftwerk (, "power station") is a German band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk were among the first successful acts to popularize the ...
*List of ambient music artists
This is a list of ambient music artists. This includes artists who have either been very important to the genre or have had a considerable amount of exposure (such as those who have been on a major label). This list does not include little-known ...
* Michael Rother
Michael Rother (born 2 September 1950) is a German experimental musician, best known for being a founding member of the influential bands Neu! and Harmonia (band), Harmonia, and an early member of the band Kraftwerk.
Early life and educatio ...
* Neu!
Neu! (; German for "New!"; styled in block capitals) were a West German krautrock band formed in Düsseldorf in 1971 by Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother following their departure from Kraftwerk. The group's albums were produced by Conny Plank, w ...
References
Other sources
* Cult Carg
Harmonia Article
Retrieved August 31, 2007.
* Roedelius, Hans-Joachi
Official Home Page - Upcoming Events
Retrieved August 31, 2007.
* Rother, Michae
Harmonia web page
. Retrieved September 1, 2007.
* Rother, Michae
Michael Rother Home Page
. Retrieved September 1, 2007.
* Wick, Sherma
Retrieved September 2, 2007.
* Bush, John Allmusic biography
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...
Retrieved September 2, 2007.
* Dumych, Danie
Harmonia article
Retrieved September 2, 2007.
* Cope, Julia
Retrieved September 4, 2005.
External links
Official website
Harmonia
on Discogs
Discogs (short for discographies) is a database of information about audio recordings, including commercial releases, promotional releases, and bootleg or off-label releases. While the site was originally created with a goal of becoming the la ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Harmonia
Musical groups established in 1973
Krautrock musical groups
German electronic music groups
Ambient music groups
Musical groups reestablished in 2007
Grönland Records artists
Brain Records artists