“One of the most important things for OMD starting out was our discovery of German electro. In the mid-‘70s all our friends were listening to prog-rock or punk. We heard Kraftwerk’s Autobahn on the radio and thought, God, this is the future!

Andy and I were in a school rock band at the time. We decided that rock was the past, so we bought all the German imports that we could find and analysed them; Kraftwerk, Neu!, LA Dusseldorf, Can. They were hugely important, they were the reasons that we started. I had an interest in electronics anyway, so I built some of our early band machines. After the band rehearsals, myself and Andy would stay behind and experiment. OMD all started from there.

If we hadn’t discovered Kraftwerk I think Andy would have gone off to art college and I would have pursued a career in electronics.

We both come from working-class backgrounds and we had no money, whereas bands like Kraftwerk had parents who were rich industrialists, so they had a budget to buy these really expensive machines. We didn’t, and so we couldn’t be purists like Kraftwerk. Traditional instruments were far cheaper, so Andy bought a bass guitar for £20 from a second-hand shop, and I bought an organ and a piano. We didn’t actually own a synth for ages. We’d either use my mad machines which didn’t make the same noise from one minute to the next, or we’d borrow a synth from the one guy we knew on the Wirral Peninsula that had one.

The theme of something like Autobahn was also important; this was a song about driving down the motorway, there was no ‘I love you, baby’ in it. What we also took from those German bands was the idea of writing songs that weren’t about love and the traditional subjects of pop music. One of our first songs [Electricity] was about electricity and how we go from carbon fuels to other sources. Quite a radical subject for a 16-year-old!

If we hadn’t discovered Kraftwerk I think we’d probably have done the rock band for a bit, got bored and Andy would have gone off to art college and I would have pursued a career in electronics.

I’ve got to know all the Kraftwerk guys through being in OMD and Andy’s done a little bit of writing with Karl Bartos, but I’ve not done any work with them myself. I’d be totally scared to work with Ralf [Hutter] or Florian [Schneider]. I’ve met so many megastars over the years, but I’ve only ever been lost for words when I met them. I shook their hands and it was like meeting God. I mean, what do you say, ‘I love you, you’re great.’? They were totally on a pedestal for us.”

History Of Modern, the first Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark album featuring original duo Paul Humphreys and Andy McCluskey since 1986’s The Pacific Age, is released September 20. The album artwork is designed by long-time OMD collaborator Peter Saville.

Images: Paul Humphreys (left) with Andy McCluskey; Peter Saville’s OMD logo