Einzelgänger – Einzelgänger, 1975

One of the early electronic masterpieces from the wizard himself, Giorgio Moroder. Einzelgänger (roughly “lone wolf”) was a one-off experiment. Moroder says that about a year after its release he realized that he didn’t like the record at all, and personally bought all the remaining LPs to prevent anyone from hearing it. He seems to be warming up to it these days, in light of “some of his friends liking it very much” and “a fan once telling him that it was very futuristic and way ahead of its time” (that Moroder needed a fan to tell him this is very sweet; thank you Facebook).

Einzelgänger is sonically unrecognizable from the disco that made Moroder famous–the record lovingly riffs on German electronica, and unsurprisingly could easily pass for early, slightly rough Kraftwerk, replete with wandering synth noodles, sputtering vocoder, hazy cabbagescapes, and schnitzeling aqua beats. (“Ich bin der Einzelgänger/Habe keine Fans/es macht mir aber Spaß, Spaß, Spaß…”, roughly “I’m the lonewolf/having no fans/but I’m having fun, fun, fun…” is presumably a play on Kraftwerk’s 1974 “fahren fahren fahren auf der Autobahn,” oft misheard as “fun fun fun on the autobahn” and probably a Beach Boys reference, so there you have it.) Only Moroder could pull off an experimental joke this skillfully. Make sure to bump this on your skateboard during your next underwater pastoral road trip, smoggy sunset viewing, automaton-themed biergarten, or post-dystopian wasteland picnic.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *