Frozen Warnings - The Music of Nico

Graham Johnston

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I should tell you that I am no Nico expert. I only recently heard her solo material for the first time when a friend loaned me copies of her first and second albums, Chelsea Girl and The Marble Index. They sat on top of my CD player for some weeks before I finally got around to listening to Chelsea Girl and was instantly blown away by what I heard.

The opening tune, "The Fairest Of The Seasons", swept me away with it within the first few bars. This song would make the perfect soundtrack to a Raymond Briggs cartoon. While Aled Jones provided the guileless soundtrack to a young boy's flight over the polar landscapes, hand in hand with a magic snowman, our Nico/Briggs collaboration would depict a similar journey in the arms of a sugar plum fairy, no doubt urging you to ram the gently falling snowflakes up your nose.

All the songs on Chelsea Girl were written for (or given to) Nico by the likes of John Cale, Lou Reed, Jackson Brown, Bob Dylan and Tim Hardin. Each provides a magical setting for Nico's unique voice, which is both openly vulnerable and resolutely untouchable at the same time. The only tune that involved Nico in the writing process is also the most avant garde of the songs on this highly approachable album. "It Was A Pleasure Then" gives us a glimpse of the direction in which Nico would move on her next three albums, complete with its Velvets-esque droning freakout.

Reed and Cale, who contributed guitar, viola, piano and bass to the album, viewed Chelsea Girl as a great disappointment, with "It Was A Pleasure Then" being the one tune that they 'rescued' from the smooth production of Tom Wilson. Nico too hated it, particularly the overdubbed flute which prompted the more singular and personal approach which she took with later releases. I disagree with every one of this album's detractors; the delicacy of the arrangements behind Nico's voice is verging on perfection, with the relatively conservative nature of the sound diminishing the power of the songs and performance not one iota. Every one of these songs is an exquisite gem, despite their (at the time) commercial nature which would never again be heard on a Nico album.

Most of Chelsea Girl fits into what was once called folk-rock (and probably still is), though I always shy away from that inherently off-putting label which I tend to interpret as meaning 'bland'. This is not a bland album and has precious little in common with Peter, Paul and Mary. The Reed, Cale and Morrison penned tunes stand among their greatest songwriting, beautifully arranged and precisely executed. Bob Dylan's "I'll Keep It With Mine" is often rumoured to have been written specially for Nico, however there is some dispute over this. Clinton Heylin, in his Bob Dylan biography Behind The Shades, states that Dylan and Nico spent the night together in 1964 after he played her his new song, "It Ain't Me Babe" and wrote "I'll Keep It With Mine" specifically for her. However, according to the notes of Bob Dylan's Biograph which offered the first official release of his version of this song, it was first recorded in 1965 and given to Judy Collins. I find it unlikely that anyone would write a song with such strong themes of companionship and friendly support as this for Nico who was not renowned for her tender altruism. Let's not overlook that she chose to terminate her relationship with the then-besotted Lou Reed in a crowded room with the words "I cannot make love to Jews anymore."

The day after I'd first listened to Chelsea Girl and The Marble Index I went out and bought them both along with her next two albums, Desertshore and The End. I was so struck by what I heard that I wanted to find out a little bit about her life, which was a surprisingly difficult task. Apart from a largely unavailable biography and James Young's book about her latter years, when she had firmly placed her music and life in general on the sidelines in favour of the numbness of heroin addiction, there is very little readily available to read. What is available tends to be highly contradictory, though very little of it flatters the subject in any way. In the liner notes to Drama Of Exile, Aaron Sixx who signed her to Aura for that album stated, "About 80 per cent of anything you read about Nico could be false. Most of it put about by her. She would say anything to get a reaction. And people would write it down."

According to popular folklore, she was born in 1938 in Budapest, named Christa Paffgen, and lived under Nazi Germany in Cologne while Churchill rained bombs all around her. Her father was conscripted into the German army and, after suffering brain damage resulting from a head wound, was killed in a concentration camp by the Nazis in 1943. At the ago of 15 Nico was raped by a US Air Force sergeant who was tried and shot for his crime. Her tour manager in the later period of her career commented:

At a similar time she started modelling, with great success, which eventually took her to New York via Rome and Ibiza, changing her name along the way. Once in New York she met Brian Jones and, later, Bob Dylan, and involved herself in the music scene, releasing a single, "I'm Not Saying" before ending up at the Factory. Warhol was so taken with her that he wanted her to front his in-house band, the Velvet Underground. This was to the absolute horror of the misogynistic band themselves, for whom women were simply not welcome. Moe Tucker had faced similar hostility from the band when she first joined - a move which was only agreed to by John Cale when he was assured that it would only be a temporary measure.

Cale wrote in his autobiography:

It seems from this quote that Cale at first valued Nico for her image rather than any musical contribution that she offered. Her coolly detached vocal phrasings were extremely distinctive, but she had another asset which made her stand out from the rest of the band during their performance: she had a poise which commandeered the attention of the audience. Notice the subtle differences between the following description of Nico's stage presence and the one quoted above from Cale:

(Bockris, 1995, 120)

It is this poise which also helps to make her voice so striking. A model learns to make every movement as precise, captivating and assured as possible, and Nico employed a similar technique in the movement of her vocal chords. Every syllable, every note was perfectly and precisely formed with such grace, in a way that mirrors a performance on a catwalk.

Nico's time with the Velvets was somewhat fraught. She continued to insist that she should be singing all the Velvets songs, regardless of the appropriateness of her voice for tunes such as "I'm Waiting For The Man" and "Heroin", and her tempestuous love-affair with Lou Reed increased the tension even further. It was a love affair which Cale referred to as being "both consummated and constipated" and Lou savoured his bitchy revenge on her by verbally attacking her at every opportunity, criticising her ability to sing, to keep time, etc etc.

By the time White Light White Heat was being written and recorded there were no more songs written for Nico to perform with the Velvet Underground. Her fall from grace from the Factory crowd, and Warhol in particular, is described by Victor Bokris in his Warhol biography thus:

(Bokris, 1989, 327)

1969 saw the release of her second solo album, The Marble Index which is her most commonly critically acclaimed work. Recorded in New York at the end of 1968, all eight songs are written by Nico, primarily composed on her harmonium. The harmonium is a nineteenth century reed organ powered by foot pedals which force air over the reeds, producing a distinctively mournful drone. Nico made this instrument her own, teaching herself to play it, with its tones making the perfect accompaniment for her icebound vocals and lyrics of forbidden fruit and folly which seldom follow any specific narrative. Her words are a collection of abstract images, which waft in and out of the sound of her harmonium's drone, with images of the unusual setting of her childhood inescapably prominent - if not in the lyrics then certainly in my head as a listener.

Although produced by Frazier Mohawk, John Cale was responsible for the arrangements and played all instruments apart from Nico's harmonium, adding further atmospherics to her haunting tunes. This music is often strangely uplifting in its simple melodies, and we can hear echoes of her songs in the later work of Diamanda Galas and Dead Can Dance, though it is likely that they were listening to the same Eastern folk tunes as Nico, rather than to Nico herself. Again it paints a picture of a magical flight over strange landscapes, particularly on the magnificent closing number, Evening Of Light, in which 'Midnight winds are landing at the end of time'. Too right they are! Cale's electric viola worms its way into the picture towards the song's end, like an itch just out of reach, as rumblings and thunderings get bigger and bolder, leading to a tumult of a musical maelstrom which leaves me floored every time.

The next two albums, Desertshore and The End, are very similar both musically and in atmosphere. Ever-so-slightly lighter and more accessible that The Marble Index, like a picture which has fully come into focus, these for me are the real delight.

Desertshore opens with the awkwardly titled "Janitor Of Lunacy" whose lyrics, when read alone, seem to be trying just a bit too hard to convey the state of Nico's psyche at this time. They read like the anguished ramblings of a troubled-teen poet whose self-absorption is so extreme that the outside world holds precious little relevance. Set to music, or rather to harmonium, the effect is entirely different and is probably one of Nico's most effective pieces. Suddenly we realise that she really means it and the outside world actually does not exist beyond the absolute fear which eventually gives way to obdurate numbness.

Except it actually gives way to "The Falconer" instead; asphyxiating in its two-dog-night isolation. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, John Cale provides a starkly contrasting dainty piano melody, giving an inkling that the thaw is just around the corner. However, it was a brief respite providing false hope; the suffocating drone washes back in again, for good this time.

Strangely, at no point does it make the listener weary. The range of styles and distinctively different tunes keep the listener feeling fresh instead of getting bogged down in the heavy atmosphere. We are even treated to a vocal by Nico's young son, providing respite from her distinctive Teutonic intonations, not that one was needed.

Desertshore and The End are produced, arranged and predominantly instrumented by John Cale (with the exception of Nico's ubiquitous harmonium, some guitar from Phil Manzanera and a few heavily wigged-out synth bursts from Brian Eno), and stand among Cale's greatest achievements as a producer. Oh yes, these albums really are up there with The Modern Lovers, The Stooges, Fear and Fragments Of A Rainy Season due to their perfectly executed and deeply affecting atmospherics; the glacial ambience is utterly penetrating.

The only weak moment on any of Nico's first four albums is the somewhat perfunctory performance of The Doors' "The End". Stripped down to the bare bones, it is about half as alluring as the original, and a quarter as cogent as her own tunes. There may well be danger on the edge of town, but when your voice is filtering through from the edge of the universe, I'm sure it would be but a mere trifle.

The years after The End saw Nico's heroin abuse worsen and consume her talents. There was no recorded output for some years due to her narcotised incapacitation. Cale wrote of his attempts to resuscitate her career in this period:

(Cale, 1999, p162)

She would have left an unblemished recorded legacy behind, but Nico returned in the 1980s to half-heartedly attempt to resurrect a career long since sidelined by the more pressing concerns of heroin addiction. These albums, while occasionally offering glimpses of something once special, merely detract from what was recently described in The Wire as:

In Young's wry yet affectionate account of Nico in the 80s, we are presented with a life gone very dreary indeed; a festering universe far removed from the rimy glamour which Nico possessed during her Factory days. It is also a chilling portrait of what happens when one's career disappears from under one's feet, though Nico appeared not to realise that her underground superstar status had very rapidly faded. Surrounded by unsympathetic musicians, she was left completely without an audience, save for the few handfuls of Velvet Underground enthusiasts dragged along and eventually let down by their own curiosity.

Sometimes, the best a person can do is to retire, which Nico did do towards the end of her life (from touring, at least). Cleaned up and relatively rejuvenated post-heroin, she was preparing to write her biography when a minor heart attack prompted her to fall badly from her bicycle, causing the brain haemorrhage which killed her at the age of 49.

The title of this piece is Frozen Warnings, named after a song on The Marble Index, which would suggest an Aesop-like moral to the end of the story, and I guess there is. Nico's story demonstrates just how easy it is for our talents to slip if we let them. Distracted by drug addiction and its narcissistic encumbrance, Nico wasted her ability to produce the chillingly beautiful music for which she should be remembered, instead of the self-centred and irresolute train-wreck we encounter in Young's Songs They Never Play On The Radio. Just to prove him wrong, you will hear plenty of her music on Clicks and Klangs Radio over the coming weeks.

From www.beefheart.com

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