Remembering the “Kernkraft 400” boom in North American sports

Few did their part to fulfill Jurgen Korduletsch’s vision quite like the Toronto Maple Leafs sound crew.

Last May, VICE ran a segment detailing the origins and rise of Zombie Nation’s “Kernkraft 400” phenomenon. The German techno artist, whose magnum opus dropped its first rendition 20 years ago Friday, gained transatlantic traction in an unintended and, from his perspective, discomfiting viewpoint.

In his VICE interview, under his real name, Zombie Nation mastermind Florian Sentfer admitted to initially shuddering at his tune’s “Stadium Chant Mix” reprise. He had nothing to do with that rendition, which originated in Italy. And the vocal onslaught of oh’s flowing in sports venues to the beat he had in turn borrowed from the video game Lazy Jones deviated his modest idea for a dance-club staple.

“To have, like, a bunch of hooligans be aggressive,” he told VICE. “It just, like, was a weird moment.”

Together with Helmut Geier, whose Gigolo Records released the first “Kernkraft 400” beat, Sentfer lawyered up to no avail. The 1999 “Kernkraft 400” had effectively mutated into a 2000 redo that spearheaded a drive toward a new era in sports-tunage staples.

It started in soccer circuits around Europe, then spread to North America. On this side of the ocean, the “Stadium Chant Remix” arguably cemented its notoriety as a new go-to goal song in hockey. But wherever a team did not experiment with it for that purpose, it was more than likely to find usage in a pregame pump-up or general context.

As the founder of Radikal Records, Korduletsch had been a key cog in the explosion of canned music. When VICE approached him last year, he recalled seeing the potential for a pattern in Zombie Nation’s lifted remix not unlike that of his earlier all-star partners.

“We had some good contacts at some sports arenas because our of prior success with 2 Unlimited, ‘Get Ready for This,’” he told the network.

The bar-setting tune Korduletsch spoke of was chiefly, and naturally, a game-starter for the better part of Radikal’s first decade. In 1995, it led off the first Jock Jams album as a mashup with Michael Buffer’s trademark “Let’s get ready to rumble!” bellow.

With or without Buffer, it was heard in an easy majority of high-profile venues during player introductions or between the national anthem and the opening faceoff/kickoff/tipoff/first pitch.

But the Maple Leafs purposed it differently. Up through the end of the 1999-2000 season, a Toronto home goal triggered a horn, then the unmistakable opening crescendo to “Get Ready for This.” The tune would continue after a recording of broadcaster Joe Bowen’s catchphrase, “Holy Mackinaw!” in lieu of Buffer.

When the Buds tuned the twine at the Air Canada Centre for the first time in 2000-01, it first sounded like nothing had changed. The same horn rang, followed by the same 2 Unlimited introductory crescendo.

But then a split-second silence gave way to incessant rapid-fire patterns of Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh, oh-oh-oh-oh. Just in time for the new millennium, someone had found their new “Get Ready for This.”

By season’s end, Zombie Nation (which many mistakenly believed to be the track’s title) became a staple on other NHL playlists. Of particular note, the eventual 2001 Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche used it as their opening-faceoff song for the playoffs.

Of course, 2 Unlimited’s legacy was not going to go dormant on command. NHL and lower-level PA systems alike kept “Get Ready for This” in its familiar spot for a handful of years.

But no later than 2001-02, the “Stadium Chant Mix” proved a formidable foe to another arena adage. When they played “Get Ready for This” after goals, the Leafs were an exception to the “Rock and Roll Part 2” norm.

Gary Glitter’s claim to fame had served its stadium function since the 1970s, long before canned music became commonplace. But by 1999, concomitant with the birth of “Kernkraft 400,” Glitter’s hideous claim to international infamy was becoming apparent.

Incredibly, many teams kept using Glitter’s work for nearly two decades during and after his slew of sex-crime convictions. “Rock and Roll Part 2” has still not entirely vanished from canned rotations and college pep-band music sheets.

For the final quarter of the 1990s, only Blur’s oven-fresh “Song 2,” with its unmistakable “Woo-hoo!” hook, stood out among Glitter’s goal-song challengers. But at the dawn of this century, there was another viable alternative, undoubtedly inspired by the Leafs and others.

The “Kernkraft 400” groundswell could not have been more palpable circa 2001-02. It was one of the few non-recycled tracks on the 2001 All-Star Jock Jams compilation. (Two of the reused ones were…drumroll…“Rock and Roll Part 2” and “Get Ready for This.” All three tunes reappeared on ESPN’s final CD, 2003’s Stadium Anthems.)

At that point, a rash of hockey teams of all levels abandoned Glitter in favor of Zombie Nation for goals. This author, for one, can recall hearing “Rock and Roll Part 2” in that role for the Grand Rapids Griffins as late as their final IHL season in 2000-01.

But “Kernkraft 400” had crashed in by the next winter in time for the team’s inaugural AHL campaign. Similarly, the Chicago Wolves were including a snippet of it as part of their celebratory mash-up.

A smattering of NHL teams, such as Edmonton, did the same. Some stuck with it, others reverted to Glitter and others pursued something fresher.

Tellingly, Toronto was among those who did not keep “Kernkraft 400” as their goal song forever. Another period of decisive change, the other side of the season-long 2004-05 NHL lockout, brought on a boom in variety across the continent.

This is not to say it was previously all Glitter, then Glitter or Blur, then Glitter, Blur or Zombie Nation. Concomitant with Toronto’s big Y2K switch, a few minor-league teams tried “Who Let the Dogs Out?” But that practice did not gain mainstream traction, and most of the franchises using it had short runs altogether.

Dating back to the mid-1990s, the New York Rangers had long distinguished themselves with “Slapshot.” In St. Louis, the organ has long defied Father Time with a twist on “When the Saints Go Marching In.” The Philadelphia Flyers and 1999 Stanley Cup finalist Buffalo Sabres were the first prominent users of “Song 2.”

But even the Sabres went on to experiment with “Kernkraft 400,” as did a few more NHL teams after the song’s novelty and peak had passed. The late Atlanta Thrashers, who started with Glitter’s tune when they launched in 1999, eventually rotated between Blur and Zombie Nation. Florida, New Jersey and Washington have all tried it as well.

And the Flyers, who also used Glitter in stretches, have since had flings with Fall Out Boy and Pennywise, just to name two. The latter’s “Bro Hymn” also fastened itself as the Anaheim Ducks’ goal song shortly before the club’s 2007 championship run.

Concurrently, the Minnesota Wild were popularizing Joe Satriani’s “Crowd Chant,” and the Chicago Blackhawks “Chelsea Dagger.” Those songs have stuck in those markets, and “Crowd Chant” also sees NHL goal-horn action via the New York Islanders, but nowhere else.

The snowballing craving for variety has trickled down to other levels, even to the point where it made headlines when the AHL’s Syracuse Crunch abandoned “Kernkraft 400” as their goal song in 2015.

 

As of 2018-19, while “Rock and Roll Part 2” has finally vanished from The Show, the Boston Bruins are the last of the NHL’s “Kernkraft 400” lamplighters. In fact, having triumphed in 2011, they are the only team to have won a Stanley Cup while using that goal song.

Contrast that with the three-peat of then-Glitter users in the 1999 Dallas Stars, 2000 New Jersey Devils and 2001 Avalanche. The Devils were still using it when they last won the Cup in 2003. Even after Zombie Nation chipped away at the old standardized guard like no other song has, the 2004 Tampa Bay Lightning and 2009 Penguins used “Rock and Roll Part 2.”

For the first half of the current decade, the Penguins ran through this age’s trite troika. Blur, Glitter and Zombie Nation all had stints with their goal horn between 2010 and 2015. But ahead of the team’s 2016 and 2017 titles, they selected something more distinctive in Andrew W.K.’s “Party Hard.”

Ironically, “Party Hard” was either a late arrival or received a belated invitation. As part of the album I Get Wet, it was released amidst the 2001-02 NHL season. Too late to compete with “Kernkraft 400” for first dibs on the unofficial distinction of the 21st century’s “Rock and Roll Part 2.”

But with the successful Penguins, it was better late than never for W.K. In 2017, he told ESPN’s Tal Pinchevsky, “I was just really moved. It means a lot to have that song be useful.”

As the tune’s artist, the hard-rocking W.K. gets a gratifying share of the goal-song pie that once seemed to solely go to a pre-disgraced glam rocker. Though the slices of publicity and recognition vary in size, he is in ample company with Blur, the Fratellis, Pennywise, Satriani and many more.

Even the techno DJ who unwittingly started the wave of variety, though at first looked primed to be the reluctant Glitter of the new millennium, has grown to embrace the arena link. Zombie Nation’s website touts “Kernkraft 400” as the project’s “landmark Song.” It adds that the chant variety is “still played as motivational anthem or in breaks almost 20 years” after the first version came out.

Compared to its formative years on athletic playlists, the remix lingers these days. But it has earned its keep, and likely the distinction of the last homogenous fad of its kind.