Published on
October 16, 2014
Category
Features
Merwyn Sanders
One half of trailblazing Chicago house duo Virgo Four, Merwyn Sanders (left) is one of the few on this list who lived the Kraftwerk invasion of Chicago first hand, the city’s frontier house music scene that owed as much to the Düsseldorf outfit as homegrown disco. As Sanders says “Kraftwerk was big in the black community in Chicago” and their influence on the foundational sound of house and techno cannot be overstated.
Kraftwerk
Computer World
(EMI, 1981)
My favourite and most influential Kraftwerk album is Computer World, my favourite and most influential Kraftwerk single was definitely ‘Trans Europe Express’. Besides it just being new and fresh to me when first hearing it, their melodies and use of them, and the funkiness’ of the electronic music they were doing just hooked me. I learned a lot by just listening. Kraftwerk was big in the black community in Chicago. Everybody was doing the “robot” to skating to it before “House” music started. ‘Trans Europe Express’ was just funky. It led to my thinking about and doing electronic music. Kraftwerk planted the seed, opened the door.