Kosmische Musik

Characteristics#

Kosmische Musik was often instrumental and characterized by “spacy”, ambient soundscapes. Artists used synthesizers such as the EMS VCS 3 and Moog Modular, as well as sound processing effects and tape-based approaches. They often rejected rock music conventions, and instead drew on “serious” electronic compositions.

Etymology#

The term “kosmische Musik” was coined in 1971 by Edgar Froese and later used by record producer Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser as a marketing term for bands such as Ash Ra Tempel, Tangerine Dream, and Klaus Schulze. The following year, Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser’s Ohr Records used the term when he released the compilation Kosmische Musik (1972) featuring tracks by Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Ash Ra Tempel, and Popol Vuh. The style would later lead to the development of new-age music, with which it shared several characteristics. It would also exert lasting influence on subsequent electronic music and avant-garde rock.

Neo-kosmische#

Neo-kosmische is a style of music which has been used to refer to post-noise group Emeralds, who “prompted a wave of millennial interest in kosmische Musik (Deuter, Klaus Schulze, Cluster et al)”. The term was also used by Pitchfork to label Brooklyn band Titan. According to the Village Voice, around 2006, Lopatin stated that the Brooklyn noise scene began to discuss the work of Klaus Schulze. Initially Lopatin was considered an outcast in the scene for introducing “’70s cosmic trance music and ’80s new age” into noise music. That same year, Canadian magazine Exclaim! referred to Daniel Lopatin on the collaborative album Instrumental Tourist as “neo-kosmische noodling”. By December, The Quietus published a review of Bee Mask’s When We Were Eating Unripe Pears by Rory Gibb, where he associated the term “neo-kosmische” with post-noise, stating “Of all the neo-kosmische/post-noise explorers whose balmy currents have lapped at our shores over the past few years, Chris Madak is among the few who seem hellbent on mapping out genuinely new territory.” In 2025, Pitchfork stated that Lopatin “was at the vanguard of the American noise scene in the hazy years when it retreated from feedback-soaked harshness into an unkanny kosmische”.

See also#

• Nu-new age
• Motorik