Indian Independence in 1947 marked a new beginning for Indo-German collaboration. Yet, it came first and foremost with continuities rather than abrupt change in the context of volatile political conditions. A host of unresolved problems awaited both newly independent India and post-war Germany. The growing tensions between Hindus and Muslim in India culminated in its partition into two states rather than one and led to Gandhis assassination. At the same time, in West Germany, after the unconditional surrender, large stretches of Germany lay in ruins and millions of refugees roamed the country looking for new homes. The parallels in the historical path India and Germany had taken were not lost on worldly observers and some mobilized them to legitimize collaboration. The hope that the end of war and colonial subjugation marked a new beginning was tempered by turmoil and turbulence that led both Germans and Indians to fall back on familiar relationships and tested patterns of economic interaction.

This chapter discusses the musical and cultural impact of the Düsseldorf group Neu!, who consisted of Michael Rother (guitars) and Klaus Dinger (drums). The essay puts Neu!’s work in the context of how Krautrock music was part of the quest to establish a new sense of post-war West German cultural identity by establishing new musical forms that did not owe a debt to the Anglo-American blues tradition or conventional rock structures. Analysing their first three albums released in the first part of the 1970s – Neu!, Neu! 2, and Neu! ’75 – this chapter shows how Neu! arrived at a musical formula that reflected the opposite temperaments of the two group members, reflected in the ambient rock of Rother and the motorik beat of Klaus Dinger, creating an imaginary West German landscape travelling from the past, through the present to the future. The chapter concludes that although they were commercially unsuccessful at the time, Neu! were hugely influential and have established for all time a unique mode of rock musical being, West German in origin, which serves as a source of inspiration for present and future generations.