Nico: the interview

Friday

I’m standing backstage in the dressing room wondering what to do next. It’s the by now all too familiar scene of every supposed star except the person in question, this time is, a 'Superstar' . The room is full of friends, pseudo friends, business associates, and general hangers on….I’m beginning to feel uncomfortably like one of them. I check in the mirror; a sea of black; be it leather or cotton. I happen to be wearing a Harris tweed jacket (very un-hip).

I ask Nico a question:

So how come you’ve only one guitarist tonight Nico…

We didn’t rehearse till an hour before because we couldn't get in touch with him.

You decided there and then so to speak?

He didn’t want to play – maybe he thought I wasn’t good enough (she laughs, drawing on her cigarette).

When are you recording the next album?

In January.

With the same musicians.

She shakes her head, different musicians.

You get bored very easily then?

No, but think it is better to change musicians for each album, already with John Cale it was too much…always the same.

You got a bit stale, with John Cale…(where did that come from?!).

No, I didn’t see him, maybe he was in the crowd…

Maybe he was hiding away.

Very possible (she laughs).

Nico turns away for a moment, confiding with her friend.
‘Nico is ready to do an interview now’, he announces, handing me a phone number.
I am to ring tomorrow.

Saturday

‘Hello it’s about the interview with Nico,’ I explain.
I’m told to arrive at 5.00 the next afternoon in Notting Hill.

Sunday
I’m walking down the elegantly wasted street of her abode, getting slightly more nervous as I near my destination; each building becoming more and more decrepit; the paint having peeled long ago…
I am greeted at the door by her friend, Antoine, into a very un-English living room. The occupant is definitely European, with all that this entails. Patio floors; African tribal masks adorn the walls, a map of the world and a small television with the sound off. While Lou Reed performs ‘Heroin’ in the background…
The first thing that strikes you is the laid back Sunday afternoon feeling; the clichés abound, leaving you wondering, For those that might be so doing, Bohemia is alive and well living in Notting Hill Gate as much as it ever was.
 
CT   Why pick ‘the End’? (the famous song my #’the Doors’) to cover?
 
N     Oh well, that is a tribute to all the movies that were ever made. Because the always say ‘The End’ at the end of the story. It was also the idea of a play.
 
CT   That’s your interpretation?
 
N      I think it was Jim Morrison’s too…but he went to film school. I met him in ’66 in New York. In the  Castle I was staying. It belonged to a friend who rented it at $200 a month. The same guy that made the film ‘La Dolce Vita’.
 
CT    How did you get the part in that?
 
N      Oh well he was a friend of a friend…
 
CT    Would you like to do more movies?
 
N      Oh, but I have made many French movies, with Phillipe Garrelle for instance. They only play in ‘Art movie houses.’
 
CT    Would you prefer these films to be more widely distributed?
 
N      No, I prefer the underground movie houses.
 
CT    More than the American style of things? What attracted you to Warhol then?
 
N      Well I like the old movies, the style of them, it’s like Phillipe Garrelle’s, because they were more or less based on the old classics, like silent movie’s, the early movies. I like improvisation…
 
CT    Which Garrelle gives you?
 
N      Yes, I would just go on the set, with a bare script, which would give me room to say and do things.
 
CT    I usually worked? (She nods her head).
 
N      What are you reading at the moment?
 
CT    I’m reading another book by Jean Genet, ‘Miracle of the Rose’. He’s about seventy years old now. Then there’s Fritz Lang’s ‘M’ for Murder’…my favourite one is the film ‘Metropolis’ though.
 
CT    What made you come to London?
 
N      To record my album!
 
CT    Did you like the sound of the album?
 
N      The ‘Aura version? No. It’s terrible the drums are at the front all the way through. (She is referring to the bootleg released in 1981). This time it will be a mixture of Arabic and jazz…I been listening to Arabic music.
 
CT    Is it true, as Sterling Morrison says that you were made to sing ‘I’ll be your mirror’ so much it upset you?
 
N      Yes, well I have this heavy German accent…(not unsurprisingly she stops a moment, preferring not to elaborate. I realise my audacity and decide to retreat to safer ground).
 
CT    How did you get the musicians for the last album?
 
N      Well, the guitarist is Persian, he says he is a Prince! He’s such a good guitarist though, I would like to use him on my next album. I met him, when I asked a friend for an oriental musician…with Clarke, he is fantastic…everything just blended in. But the main thing was the guitar. We ended up having to record it twice because the guy from ‘Aura’ stole our master tapes…

CT   And that’s where the bootleg comes in?
 
N     Yes. It wasn’t finished, we had to do the vocals over again. It was only half done, he just took the masters and split.
 
CT  There was no way of stopping it’s release?
 
N     No, but he’s stropped pressing it in Holland now.
 
CT   (I move to another subject). Do you find much difficulty staying in one place for any length of time?
 
N     Not anymore. It doesn’t matter…I feel at home anywhere I go.
 
CT   What was the background to the ‘Chelsea Girls’?
 
N     It was made with two projectors in mind, it’s four and half hours long…split screen, in all it’s nine hours. It was all about the people staying  in the Chelsea Hotel.
 
CT   Did they mind you filming there?
 
N     No, they were all ‘Superstars’ anyway. (She laughs).
 
CT   Andy Warhol directed it, but afterwards Paul Morrissey took over…
 
N     Yes, that’s because Andy was very troubled by the shooting, I think he was afraid to go out on to the street. (This being the reference to the Valerie Solanis shooting at the old Factory in 1968).
 
CT   And yet he stayed in New York?
 
N     Well Andy’s got houses all over the world, in every major city. He has four in New York, he’s a house collector. (She laughs).
 
CT   I know the ‘Rolling Stones’ rehearsed at one of them.
 
N     Montauk. They had rented the place for a few months…but it’s haunted, there are ghosts there…you don’t see them, but you feel them…
 
CT  Does any one stay there still?
 
N    Of course, but they don’t know that…only sensitive people know that. I know that…
 
CT  Have you had many experiences like that?
 
N    No. But I have met people who have practised ‘Black Magic’. There are people in New York who are very dangerous. Just recently a gang followed me to my hotel and tried to force their way in. I had to kick at her face…to get rid of them. (She stops a moment). That reminds me of when I was staying at another castle with some German girls, they were lesbians…I freaked out. I was going insane.
 
At this point she declined to carry on the story, it being an obviously too harrowing episode. Throughout the interview, I became aware of the fact that I was only scratching the surface, that Nico, after beginning her answers, realised the peril of explaining too graphically her past. As though the skeletons in her cupboard were still rattling…

          Third part will be added soon...

Copyright 1982: Charles Tempest          All rights reserved. No printing, publication without prior authorisation from the author.