Tour de France

Recorded at Kraftwerk’s Kling Klang studio in Düsseldorf during the early-1980s sessions for the abandoned cycling-themed project that later fed into Electric Café. The original single was issued in summer 1983, with music credited to Ralf Hütter, Florian Schneider, and Karl Bartos. Released as a standalone single in 1983, it turned Kraftwerk’s Tour de France concept into a charting pop record and became one of the group’s best-known singles in the UK. Its cycling imagery and motoric rhythm fit the band’s early-1980s shift toward more compact, single-friendly electronics. The track remained a touchstone for Kraftwerk’s cycling theme and was later remixed and reissued, most notably as part of the 1999 single release and as a foundation for Tour de France Soundtracks in 2003. It also became a heavily sampled and covered piece in later electronic and dance music.