Nico
Christa Päffgen, known by her stage name Nico, was a German singer, songwriter, actress and model.
Nico had roles in films including Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita and Andy Warhol's Chelsea Girls. At the insistence of Warhol, she sang lead on three songs of the Velvet Underground's debut album, The Velvet Underground & Nico. At the same time, she released her debut album, Chelsea Girl, composed of songs written by other musicians. At the suggestion of her friend Jim Morrison, she started writing her own material, using a harmonium, not traditionally a rock instrument. John Cale of the Velvet Underground became her musical arranger and produced The Marble Index, Desertshore, The End... and other albums.
In the 1980s, Nico toured extensively in Europe, United States, Australia and Japan. After a concert in Berlin in June 1988, she went on holiday in Ibiza, where she died from a cerebral haemorrhage following a bicycling accident.
Early life
Nico was born Christa Päffgen in Cologne to Wilhelm and Margarete "Grete" Päffgen. Wilhelm was born into the wealthy Päffgen Kölsch master brewer family dynasty in Cologne and was Catholic, while Grete came from a lower-class background and was Protestant. Richard Witts notes in his book Nico: The Life and Lies of an Icon that Nico has given differing accounts about her background.When Nico was two years old, she moved with her mother and grandfather to the Spreewald forest outside Berlin to escape the World War II bombardments of Cologne.
Her father was conscripted into the Wehrmacht at the onset of the war, but there are several conflicting accounts as to when and how he died. According to biographer Richard Witts in his 1995 book Nico: The Life and Lies of an Icon, Wilhelm Päffgen was gravely wounded in 1942 after having been shot in the head by a French sniper. With no certainty that he would survive, his commanding officer, following standing orders, ended Päffgen's life by gunshot. Another story is that he sustained head injuries that caused severe brain damage, and spent the rest of his life in a psychiatric institution. According to unproven rumours, he was variously said to have died in a concentration camp, or to have faded away as a result of shell shock.
In 1946, Nico and her mother relocated to Berlin, where Grete worked as a seamstress. Nico attended school until the age of 13, and began selling lingerie in the exclusive department store KaDeWe, eventually getting modelling jobs in Berlin. At, and with chiseled features and pale skin, Nico rose to prominence as a fashion model when still a teenager.
Career
Acting and modelling (1955–1964)
Nico was discovered at 16 by photographer Herbert Tobias while both were working at a KaDeWe fashion show in Berlin. He gave her the name "Nico" after a man he had fallen in love with, filmmaker Nikos Papatakis, and she used it for the rest of her life. She moved to Paris and began working for Vogue, Tempo, Vie Nuove, Mascotte Spettacolo, Camera, Elle, and other fashion magazines. Around this time, she dyed her brown hair blonde, later claiming she was inspired to do so by Ernest Hemingway. At age 17, she was contracted by Coco Chanel to promote their products, but she fled to New York City and abandoned the job. Through her travels, she learned to speak English, Spanish, and French.In 1959 she had an uncredited speaking part in Mario Lanza's last film For the First Time. In the same year she was invited to the set of Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita, where she attracted the attention of the acclaimed director, who gave her a minor role in the film as herself. By that time, she was living in New York and taking acting classes with Lee Strasberg.
After a role in the 1961 Jean Paul Belmondo film A Man Named Rocca, she appeared as the cover model on jazz pianist Bill Evans' 1962 album, Moon Beams. After splitting her time between New York and Paris, she got the lead role in Jacques Poitrenaud's Strip-Tease. She recorded the title track, which was written by Serge Gainsbourg but not released until 2001, when it was included in the compilation Le Cinéma de Serge Gainsbourg.
Early singing work
In New York, Nico first met Greek filmmaker Nico Papatakis, whose name she had adopted as her stage name several years earlier. The two lived together between 1959 and 1961. After noticing her singing around the apartment, Papatakis asked her if she had ever considered a career in music and ended up enrolling her in her first singing lessons.In 1965, Nico met the Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones and recorded her first single, "I'm Not Sayin'", with the B-side "The Last Mile", produced by Jimmy Page for Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label. Actor Ben Carruthers introduced her to Bob Dylan in Paris that summer. In 1967, Nico recorded his song "I'll Keep It with Mine" for her first album, Chelsea Girl.
The Velvet Underground (1966–67)
After being introduced by Brian Jones, she began working in New York with Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey on their experimental films, including Chelsea Girls, The Closet, Sunset and Imitation of Christ. Warhol began managing the Velvet Underground, a New York City rock band and he proposed that the group take on Nico as a "chanteuse", an idea to which they consented, reluctantly for both personal and musical reasons.The group became the centerpiece of Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable, a multimedia performance featuring music, lighting, film and dance. Nico sang lead vocals on three songs, and backing vocal on "Sunday Morning", on the band's debut album, The Velvet Underground & Nico. Reviewer Richard Goldstein describes Nico as "half goddess, half icicle" and writes that her Velvet Underground vocal "sounds something like a cello getting up in the morning".
Nico's tenure with the Velvet Underground was marked by personal and musical difficulties. Multi-instrumentalist John Cale wrote that Nico's long dressing room preparations, and pre-performance ritual of burning a candle, often held up performances, which especially irritated songwriter Lou Reed. Nico's partial deafness sometimes caused her to veer off key, for which she was ridiculed by other band members. The album became a classic, ranked 13th on Rolling Stones 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, though it was poorly received at the time of its release.
Early solo career (1967–1977)
Immediately following her musical work with the Velvet Underground, Nico began work as a solo artist, performing regularly at The Dom in New York City. At these shows, she was accompanied by a revolving cast of guitarists, including members of the Velvet Underground, Tim Hardin, Tim Buckley, Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Jackson Browne.For her debut album, 1967's Chelsea Girl, she recorded songs by Bob Dylan, Tim Hardin, and Jackson Browne, among others. Velvet Underground members Lou Reed, John Cale and Sterling Morrison contributed to the album, with Nico, Reed and Cale co-writing one song, "It Was a Pleasure Then." Chelsea Girl is a traditional chamber-folk album, with strings and flute arrangements added by producer Tom Wilson. Nico had little say in its production, and was disappointed with the result; she said in 1981: "I still cannot listen to it, because everything I wanted for that record, they took it away. I asked for drums, they said no. I asked for more guitars, they said no. And I asked for simplicity, and they covered it in flutes!... They added strings, and— I didn't like them, but I could live with them. But the flute! The first time I heard the album, I cried and it was all because of the flute." In California, Nico spent time with Jim Morrison of the Doors, who encouraged her to write her own songs.
For The Marble Index, released in 1968, Nico wrote the lyrics and music. Nico's harmonium anchored the accompaniment, and harmonium became her signature instrument for the rest of her career. John Cale arranged the album, adding an array of folk and classical instruments. The album has a European “classical” avant-garde sound, often described as bleak, difficult or frightening. The album also marked a radical change in Nico's appearance and image. She once again dyed her hair, this time from blonde to red, and began dressing mostly in black, a look that would be considered a visual prototype for the gothic rock scene that would emerge in subsequent years.
A promotional film for the song "Evening of Light" was filmed by Francois de Menil. This video featured the now red-haired Nico and Iggy Pop of the Stooges.
Returning to live performance in the early 1970s, Nico gave concerts in Amsterdam as well as London, where she and John Cale opened for Pink Floyd. 1972 saw a one-off live reunion of Nico, Cale and Lou Reed at the Bataclan in Paris.
Nico released two more solo albums in the 1970s, Desertshore and The End.... She wrote the music, sang, and played the harmonium. Cale produced and played most of the other instruments on both albums. The End... featured Brian Eno on synthesizer and Phil Manzanera on guitar, both from Roxy Music. She appeared at the Rainbow Theatre, in London, with Cale, Eno, and Kevin Ayers. The album June 1, 1974 resulted from this concert. Nico performed a version of the Doors' "The End", which was the catalyst for The End... later that year.
Between 1970 and 1979, Nico made about seven films with French director Philippe Garrel. She met Garrel in 1969 and contributed the song "The Falconer" to his film Le Lit de la Vierge. Soon after, she was living with Garrel and became a central figure in his cinematic and personal circles. Nico's first acting appearance with Garrel occurred in his 1972 film, La Cicatrice Intérieure. Nico also supplied the music for this film and collaborated closely with the director. She also appeared in the Garrel films Athanor ; the silent Jean Seberg feature Les Hautes Solitudes, released in 1974; Un ange passe ; Le Berceau de cristal, starring Pierre Clémenti, Nico and Anita Pallenberg; and Voyage au jardin des morts. His 1991 film J'entends Plus la Guitare is dedicated to Nico.
On 13 December 1974, Nico opened for Tangerine Dream's concert at Reims Cathedral in Reims, France. Around this time, Nico became involved with Berliner musician Lutz Ulbrich, guitarist for Ash Ra Tempel. Ulbrich would accompany Nico on guitar at many of her subsequent concerts through the rest of the decade. Also in this time period, Nico let her hair return to its natural brown color but continued wearing mostly black. This would be her public image from then on. Nico and Island Records allegedly had many disputes during this time, and in 1975 Island dropped her from their roster.