Michael Rother

Michael Rother

Michael Rother is a German experimental musician and composer from Hamburg, known for work in krautrock, art rock and electronic music. He is primarily a guitarist and keyboard player, and also works as a multi-instrumentalist.

Early bands and collaborations

Rother co-founds Neu! with drummer Klaus Dinger. The group records five albums between 1971 and 1996. He also works with Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius, known as Cluster, in Harmonia, which releases two albums in 1974 and 1975. Later Harmonia sessions from 1976, recorded with Brian Eno, are issued many years after they are made.

Rother and Dinger also play in a short-lived version of Kraftwerk in 1971 with Florian Schneider, while Ralf Hütter is temporarily away from the band. This lineup appears on German television on Beat Club.

Solo work

Rother begins releasing albums under his own name in the late 1970s. His early solo records include Flammende Herzen, Sterntaler and Katzenmusik, all of which feature drums by Jaki Liebezeit of Can. He continues with Fernwärme, Lust, Süssherz und Tiefenschaerfe and Traumreisen in the 1980s. In the late 1990s he regains the rights to these recordings and reissues CD editions with bonus tracks, often including remixes of earlier material. This period also includes the compilation Radio and the album Esperanza.

Remember (The Great Adventure) appears in 2005 and is his first album to include vocals.

Later activity

Rother joins the Red Hot Chili Peppers for a live jam in Hamburg in 2007. He also tours with Dieter Moebius as Rother & Moebius that year, and a Harmonia reunion concert takes place in Berlin, marking the group’s first live performance since 1976. A later project is Hallogallo 2010.