A Form of Utopianism: Cluster’s Sowiesoso at 50

From avant garde beginnings to ambient endings, Cluster reconfigured rock music as much as Kraftwerk, says Toby Manning. In the late 70s and early 80s, British music took a distinctly European turn, from Bowie’s “Heroes” in 1977 to Ultravox’s ‘Vienna’ in 1981, peaking with Kraftwerk’s ‘The Model’ hitting UK no. 1 the following year. Whether it was the after-effects of the EEC referendum or a growing anti-Americanism in the wake of Watergate and Vietnam, this new Europeanism temporarily sidelined music’s traditional Transatlantic passage for the artier terrain over the Channel. Chart hits like

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