Nico: The Wayward Beauty of Solitary Confinement

 

“I have been in the highest and the lowest and both places are empty.” - Nico

 

Why even ask—Who is Nico — she that was born Christa Päffgen in Cologne in 1938? Survives the Nazis... Then in Paris. She’s 16 and meets Coco Chanel. Models. Gets bored. Travels to New York City. Studies acting with Lee Strasberg. Talks to Marilyn Monroe.

1959. In Rome. Hello to Frederico Fellini. Gets bit part in La Dolce Vita. Really, who is she?

Back in New York City. 1963. Sings ‘My Funny Valentine’ at the Blue Angel Club. Can barely stay in key, but that makes it better. A determined contralto if you will. Rarely smiles.

Hey, she’s over in Paris. With Serge Gainsborough and then pregnant by Alan Delon. Has a son. Leaves him behind.

Hangs with Brian Jones. He plays, along with Jimmy Page, on her first EP.

Really, how does this happen to one person?

In London, meets Andy Warhol’s friend, then off to New York City again. Calls Andy. Her first line to him. “I only like the food that floats in the wine.” Warhol is thunderstruck.

Nico enters Warhol's Factory and dethrones Edie Sedgwick. Such is life.  Meets Bob Dylan. He gives her a song.

Stars in three Factory films. Andy becomes manager of The Velvet Underground. Says he wants Nico to sing. Member Lou Reed disagrees. Nico sings. She is what happens when the Weimar meets the Haight.

Parts from the Velvets. Makes music of her own. Now to Los Angeles. Beds Jim Morrison. Next morning, Morrison is found naked, dancing on a rooftop. Nico, also naked, is crying in a garden. Lots of drugs. Goes from Jim to Iggy Pop. Interesting progression.

Records music. Takes lovers. Wanders the world. Dies in Ibiza, 1988. Age 49. Today, revered as a Goth pioneer.

Some artists follow a muse; for others, the muse is themselves. It’s an involuntary reaction. Nico lived as she did to stay alive. A soul in solitaire. 

Look closely, her eyes are rimmed with frost, for her beauty comes from the pain you see when a face is frozen by tears.

 

#nico #andywarhol #loureed #jimmorrison #thedoors #iggypop #goth #music #blog #pop #1960s #ChristaPäffgen #leonardcohen #bobdylan #fellini #velvetunderground

Jim Morrison: Rage from the Stage but Think on the Page

 

Whether he lacked the talent or time to develop into a great poet remains unclear. Much of Jim Morrison’s brief life is obscured—perhaps strategically—with vague pronouncements, clumsy metaphors, spacey diatribes and art house pretension. But when he was great, he drifted far beyond expectations, completely original, yet always too smart for the job.

Importantly, Jim Morrison looked like a rock star. The image matched the music—perfectly. In 1967, he invented how a rock star must appear—the hair, the leather pants, the boots, even the attitude. So powerful is the image of Morrison that his influence remains undiminished.

With The Doors, he found a band to match his dark visions. Ray Manzarek’s brooding organ seemed wired to Morrison’s dread. When Morrison died, so did The Doors, though they struggled for a while, pushed on by the momentum of their silent singer.  

He grew uncomfortable with show business, more artist than magician, more preacher than singer, hungering for fame until aware too late his soul had stopped. You can rage from the stage but only think on the page.

Restless demons empowered his words. He battled bravely until no drug or drink could forestall The Big Sleep—which was his end game anyway. Or maybe not.  With months to live, he was trying to get better in Paris, get his lungs back, repair a heart damaged by rheumatic fever, but never made it. His girlfriend didn’t help. Or maybe it was all predestined, just as he had predicted.  Like his contemporary, George Harrison, much of Morrison’s life seems passed in preparation for death. And Death always obliges the eager.

At Pere Lachaise Cemetery, Jim Morrison appears nightly, courtesy of The 27 Club, alone in a dimly lit corner, forever searching for that single, indelible, timeless line that always tells the truth.

#jimmorrison #thedoors #lizardking #lawoman #lightmyfire #classicrock #perelachaise #georgeharrison #1960s #rock #music #27club #losangeles #whiskeyagogo

 

Jean de Breteuil: The Jet-Setting Angel of Death

“Jean wаѕ a horrible guy, ѕоmеоnе who had crawled out from under a stone. Sоmеhоw I ended uр with him…it wаѕ аll аbоut drugs аnd sex.” – Marianne Faithful

“The devil hath power to assume a pleasing shape.” - Shakespeare

Jean de Breteuil. As a drug dealer/addict, he was in the right business. He just wasn’t good at it. Jim Morrison. Jimi Hendrix. Brian Jones. Janis Joplin. Talitha Getty. Pam Courson. Keith Richards. All clients, all dead – except for Keith Richards – for as we all know, what doesn’t destroy Keith only makes him

Jean de Breteuil: Jet-setting

stronger.

Maybe along the way, Jean’s self-loathing somehow metastasized into homicidal fantasies. Likely he didn’t care. Perhaps his spirit was cast at Altamont. He himself overdosed at the age of twenty-two. 1972.

Devil assumes a pleasing shape

The devil hath power to assume a pleasing shape.One could argue that taking out Morrison and Joplin changed the course of rock music, however subtly. His involvement with Hendrix and Jones was more tangential.

.

His family owned French-language newspapers in North Africa. On the death of his father, he inherited the title of 'Count de Breteuil'. A debauched aristocrat if ever there was. Became a Eurotrash, drug-addled playboy. A rock n’ roll celebrity  drug enabler.

A few of his customers

What to make of it? ‘Heroin Dealer to the Stars’ isn’t a typical career choice. Who knows his passions. But when so many of your customers become young corpses, one may question a professional aptitude.

Jean de Breteuil. The soundtrack of his life should include The Pusher, People Are Strange, and for this jet-setting junkie, Hank Williams’ Angel of Death. “The Angel of Death/ Will come from the sky/ And claim up your soul/ When the time comes to die.” RIP.