Various anecdotes have emerged over the years confirming the band’s distant persona, like the fact they had a phone in the studio, but would only switch it on when they were expecting a call. Public visits are not exactly encouraged. These days the band work in a studio 20 miles out of town, in an undisclosed location. When I visited, a solitary traffic cone was the only oblique clue that this was the spot where wonders were hewn. The Elektro Muller sign still hangs over the door, but there is no plaque. The original Kling Klang Studio, where they worked from 1974 to 2008, producing all of their classic studio albums, can still be found on Mintropstrasse, a slightly grubby street in the red light district, minutes from the main train station. The band members are notoriously private creatures, preferring to keep their enigma alive than let us see behind the curtain.

(As David Stubbs’ wide-ranging book Future Days shows, the very term ‘krautrock’, while fraught with controversy for some, has been accepted, albeit ironically, by many of the scene’s players.) Besides the obvious twin behemoths of Kraftwerk and Neu!, Dusseldorf gave us the art punk of DAF (Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft), the proto-industrial of Die Krupps, and the high-concept, ZTT-masterminded glossy pop of Propaganda.Ībove all, the city gave us Kraftwerk. The tourist board launched the We Love Music walking tour in 2011 on the back of the city hosting the Eurovision Song Contest, though it does cover Kraftwerk at the more credible end of the spectrum.įor the krautrock faithful, there are certainly plenty of sights to take in and history to soak up.

Still, electronic music is hardly a spring chicken and it’s strange to think that these sounds, which once seemed so futuristic and avant-garde, have become heritage fodder too. Dusseldorf’s music trail is readily discovered by the cognoscenti, but it’s not exactly trumpeted from the rooftops. It rarely features in lists of major music cities worldwide, but such accolades are usually reserved for destinations that fit neatly into the conventional rock canon. When it comes to cities renowned for their musical heritage, Dusseldorf is pretty unassuming.

Future Sounds by David Stubbs