The Model by Kraftwerk

Album: The Best of Kraftwerk (1981)

Charted: 1

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Songfacts®:

This song was inspired by the models who worked at The Bagel nightclub in Cologne. It is the story of a high fashion model as she gets through her busy day.
This was Kraftwerk's only UK #1 hit. It was the first German record to top the UK chart and was followed within the next few months by two more chart-topping German acts - The Goombay Dance Band and Nicole. (It could be argued that Boney M, who had some UK #1s in the late 1970s were German, but none of the female members of the group were German-born).
This song first appeared on Kraftwerk's 1978 album The Man Machine. It was also on the B-side of "Neon Lights," but the German DJs preferred "The Model." At the time, the song made no impact outside of Germany. In the UK, it was released three years later as a double A-side along with "Computer Love" and again this was mainly the track the DJs played.

Comments: 10

Daltronix from Iowa, United StatesThis was also covered by The Members and David Byrne did a version on Sessions at West 54th Street TV show.
Chris from Germany When they released Man Machine in 1978 they had no idea that they wrote music history with this song. This song was ahead of their time and so I have looked what kind of music at that time was famous and nothing sounded nearly like this

And so it was not a wonder when they re released it as a b side to Computer Love in the UK it was a hit. Not Computer Love but this was played by BBC the djs etc.
Drew T Jensen from West Covina, CaThe first cover of this song was by Phil "Snakefinger" Lithman, which was on the "Chewing Hides the Sound" album, and was the last single from that album.
Kent from Toronto, CanadaTo Matt from Pinetown: the counting of "eins, zwei, drei, vier" to establish timing is not a parody of English groups, as groups the world over count to set the time. (Russians count, "raz, dva, tri, chetirye", for example.) Ironic, however, might be that setting time would be irrelevant to a group whose beat comes from a machine....
Kent from Toronto, CanadaThe German spelling of "Modell" with double "L" is based on the older German term for (fashion) model, "Fotomodell", with the last syllable stressed. Today, a fashion model is generally called, "das Model", single "L", with the first syllable stressed as in English, while other types of models, objects, archtypes or paradigms, are still called "Modell". with the seceond syllable stressed. The English version is sung cool and deadpan throughout, while the German origin has the one word "korrekt!" sung uncharacteristically loud and with some force.
Matt from Pinetown, South AfricaIn concert, they count "eins zwei drei vier". This originally comes from the 1977 album release of Showroom Dummies (aka Schaufensterpuppen, aka Les Mannequins) and is a parody of the English-language rock groups shouting "One Two Three Four!".
Matt from Pinetown, South AfricaFor Kraftwerk, known for singing about machines and contraptions, this is the only song of theirs about a human being. And it became #1 in the UK.
Matt from Pinetown, South AfricaDuring a tester before a concert, Ralf Huetter sings the final line as "Now she's a big success I'd like to f*** her again". This is the only known time that Kraftwerk has cussed in public. This is available on bootleg but is rare.
Matt from Pinetown, South AfricaDas Modell was covered by Rammstein. They wanted to rename it "Die Hure" (the whore) but Kraftwerk stopped them, so it became a straight cover version.
Matt from Pinetown, South AfricaThis song was released in German countries as Das Modell.

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