MAY 26, 2014 10:57PM
The Mother of Punk and I (Part 2)
From TouserPress.com
Hagen recorded Nunsexmonkrock
in New York with a band that includes both Paul Shaffer and Chris
Spedding. To describe it as wild hardly suffices — the
drugs-sex-religion-politics-mystical imagery that spills out is nearly
incomprehensible in its bag-lady solipsism, but the music and singing
combine into an aural bed of nails that carries stunning impact. It
almost doesn't matter that Hagen sticks to English; what counts is the
phenomenal vocal drama. Her range seems limitless, and the countless
characters she plays make this fascinating.
Salt Lake City, 2013
There are two songs that haunt my iPod while I'm walking my sweet dog; both are from Nina Hagen's Nunsexmonkrock. I'll discuss one of them in another post. The one that hypnotized me (as much of that album does) is called "Iki Maska."
It makes me crave insanity and an operatic voice.
How many people would sit through a song like this? How many people would lip synch weird double-tracked German lyrics that they can't understand?
I call my wife's iPod the "Normal People iPod" for a reason ...
Litchfield County, Connecticut, circa 1983
My father had just returned from a Japan business trip. He brought back one of those crazy cool new tech innovations sure to revolutionize the music industry: the Walkman.
It came with a radio. I turn the dial to the left. I stumble upon the college radio station 91.7 WXCI. Speak to some Connecticut kids of my generation and they can tell you how much that radio station impacted their lives for the better.
The first New Wave song I ever heard comes on (technically untrue, as I had heard "Come on Eileen" prior to this) and it's Terri Nunn crooning inappropriately filthy things into my innocent, blushing 5th grade ears.
Eventually, "New York, New York" comes on:
New York City, NY circa 1996
It was another winter Sunday of empty aimless wandering through the greatest city in the world, afraid to do anything but eat, collect and drink my feelings away. Not a good time inside my head.
St. Mark's Place had punk culture for sale, a comic book store and used record stores. It may still have those, along with some Afghan restaurants and cheap sushi you wouldn't touch.
I came home with three cassette tapes I should have had at a much earlier point in my life: The Best of Joy Division, Loveless by My Bloody Valentine, and Nunsexmonkrock by Nina Hagen.
Whereas the Joy Division music let me bathe in my confused depressed feelings in a idiotically romantic fashion, and Loveless revived my near dead heart with its sublime beauty, Nunsexmonkrock hypnotized me with its intense mysticism.
I expected a UFO abduction any second.
Nunsexmonkrock is a masterpiece.
Firenze, Italy, circa 1991
Firenze, with its old world elegance; its scores of the beautiful and stylish and its Rennaissance ground zero treasures. And all I wanted to do was browse record stores and book stores.
I pick up the eponymous Nina Hagen album of 1991. The opening track told of Nina's "super-freak family" and seeing Sid Vicious and getting dissed by Prince. There were some guest vocals from Lemmy Kilminster and of course, the obligatory outer-space song.
There was a beautiful rendition of "Ave Maria":
Oh, and a rap song about Mikhail Gorbachev! It was post-glasnost Berlin wall fever, after all.
Litchfield County, Connecticut, 1985
My sister was home from college. We were hanging out and listening to the radio. The dial was on 91.7 WXCI.
Then suddenly we hear Nina's voice suddenly extolling the virtues of Russian girls and boys, and their blue jeans. My sister and I frown and laugh. It's that weird German chick again. I imagine that the song is some sort of anti-Soviet Union message (it's not). It interests me secretly but I don't admit it.
Litchfield County, Connecticut, circa 1987
Sophmore year of high school. The cool kid Jason and I talk music and horror movies in study hall. Jason was both cool-popular and smart, and edgy. He was no sheep.
When we talked music he brought up Nina Hagen. He said she was great and that she had political songs about Russia - which let me put 2 and 2 together from when my sister and I heard it on the radio.
He let me borrow his cassette tape of In Ekstasy, Nina Hagen's follow up to Fearless. I would end up borrowing it from him over and over again until I just taped it.
It's not the work of art that Nunsexmonkrock is, but I was and still remain quite obsessed by it.
My Way: Her spin on "My Way" is just as ferociously punk as that of Sid Vicious, but with more humor and benevolence (even if it was in German and couldn't really understand it; all I know is she doesn't sing "you cuuunt, I'm not a queeeer").
Prima Nina in Ekstasy: I still love to hear this piece of early hip-hop braggadocio wherein Nina proclaims herself the Mother of Punk, and the Queen of Punk-Funk. Where she tells people not to be sleazy or take it easy or be fanatic or dramatic. Where she states that she likes herself and knows who she is. Where she states that she thinks she's tough and she knows how to hip-hop.
She does this with the help of Afrika Bambataa, who has had some interest in the punk movement.
Our social studies/humanities teacher my senior year taught us about medieval art, ectsasy and religious mysticism. He showed us slides of the statue of St. Theresa D'Avila.
"I'm in Heavenly agony/when I fulfill my destiny" the lyric goes.
It clicked with me. Nina was a punk St. Theresa D'Avila and her declaration of being in Ekstasy wasn't some sort of exhibitionist sexual Madonna thing. Ekstasy was spiritual, it was sense of purpose and strength. And UFOs. Lots and lots of UFOs.
Spirit in the Sky and The Lord's Prayer: I'll discuss religion, mysticism and blasphemy in part 3 or 4. But this disco-synth cover Norman Greenbaum's "Spirit in the Sky" is actually pretty powerful. It climaxes with a powerful operatic growl: "THIS IS. THE REVOLUTION. OF THE SPIRIT. IN. THE. SKY!" "The Lord's Prayer" is fabulous punk adrenaline married to Nina's incredible voice.
And the rest of the album? "Atomic Flash Deluxe" is a single that only someone powerful and confident in her own iconoclastic insanity could write. I love it, and it would belong in Dr. Strangelove. "Universal Radio" yielded a European club hit, and "1985 Ekstasy Drive" has something to do about visiting her in LA and going to "seventh heaven".
Litchfield, Connecticut, 1989
In the car, listening to WXCI, the DJ puts on a new song from Nina Hagen. It's titled "Punk Wedding."
It was a four song EP celebrating her marriage to an 18 year old punk named 'Iroquois'. It's tough to find these singles. The one I originally heard was a gleefully silly dub reggae version. The one I finally happened to tape off the radio and then "download" (whoops)was a speedy punk version.
When I first saw Nina in concert in 1995, she talked about how she was never married. "Well, there was Iroquois," she then recalled. "But that was a mistake."
To be continued...
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Comments
I love the way you’ve
structured/threaded the various elements and memories in this piece. I
can’t remember when I last heard “Nunsexmonkrock” but this makes me want
to hear it again. “Smack Jack” was always a favourite and a track that
received heavy airplay on my local college station. Later on, when I
became a DJ there, I remember playing her “Punk Wedding” single when it
came out.
And on that topic, thanks for discussing the effect that alternative radio had on you. I know that it made a big impact on my life in a variety of ways (and will be writing about it soon). Looking forward to the next part.
And on that topic, thanks for discussing the effect that alternative radio had on you. I know that it made a big impact on my life in a variety of ways (and will be writing about it soon). Looking forward to the next part.
This is magnificent.
I've never heard of Nina Hagen; from what little I've sampled here
though she makes my notions of what I've always thought of as "punk"
seem very narrow.
It's been a long time and I can't say for sure but she's reminiscent of Yoko Ono.
Looking forward to going back and reading Pt. 1 - tomorrow.
It's been a long time and I can't say for sure but she's reminiscent of Yoko Ono.
Looking forward to going back and reading Pt. 1 - tomorrow.
VA - thanks! Yep,
college radio is pretty important. I found one here in SLC that is
pretty much like WXCI. The next post is going to be intimidating for
me, because it's about the times I've seen Nina in concert. And when it
comes to writing about concert-going, you sir are a very tough act to
follow!
Hi Margaret - yep, people have the stereotype of "punk" in their minds, but all it really is is a radical act of creative freedom, for good or ill. As for the Yoko comparison, I can see it based on the screeches and incoherent warblings and experimental noise, but Nina is an opera-trained vocal talent. Yoko, not so much.
Hi Margaret - yep, people have the stereotype of "punk" in their minds, but all it really is is a radical act of creative freedom, for good or ill. As for the Yoko comparison, I can see it based on the screeches and incoherent warblings and experimental noise, but Nina is an opera-trained vocal talent. Yoko, not so much.
Brecht & Weill, Lucile Ball and Lotte Lenya... with that last little twist of Leonard Bernstein very cool R&R ;-)
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