Nina Hagen:

After working w/ various bands including the Alfons-Wonnenberg-Orchester, the Leipzig-based band "Automobil", "Fritzens Dampferband" & the Slits in London she started her own band, the "Nina Hagen Band" at the end of 1977, consisting mainly of former members of the political rock cabaret "Lokomotive Kreuzberg".

Her wildly popular debut album "Nina Hagen Band" appeared in 1978 followed by her first grand tour through Germany. Punk attitude, sloppy poetry and the coloratura interludes of their lead-singer, it was said, had made "Nina Hagen Band" one of the hottest bands in Europe besides the "Sex Pistols".

During a tour through European capitals, she separated from her excellently reputed band. According to contract though, the album "Unbehagen" was still produced with the band in 1979.

In 1982, her first solo album "NunSexMonkRock" appeared in the US, a mixture of funk, hard rock, fragments of the Islam and medieval witch cults, and futuristic UFO-fantasies.

Her political views ran along the lines of protesting loudly against apartheid in South Africa & participating in activities against wearing fur and branded animal testing. To help deliver her message she left CBS and contracted with the record label "Phonogramm" producing the album "Nina Hagen" offering again a rather cutting type of rock 'n' roll. She also dropped the glaring make-up & hair-styles.

In 1995 the album "Freud Euch" appeared - all in German and again very punky -, which was recorded in English under the title "Beehappy" in 1996 (among others by Dee Dee Ramone).

"India" became a major issue in Nina's life. Since 1993, she had traveled this country and spent a lot of time in an ashram within proximity to the Tibetan border. In 1999, she recorded the album "Om Namah Shivay" including mainly Indian songs. Half of its profits went into charitable projects.

In 1999, she sang the part of Mrs. Peachum on a new recording of the "Dreigroschenoper" together with the "Frankfurter Ensemble Modern" for which she won her first Echo Award. The work on her album "The Return of the Mother" that appeared in February 2001 took her three years. She was her own producer this time & to promote the sales of her album, She started a tour through Germany under the title "1008 Indian Nights", because "India is my spiritual mother", as Hagen declared in an interview. In May of 2000, her song "Schön ist die Welt" came out & became the official song of the EXPO 2000.

She is currently recording a new album and plans to tour later in the year. -Mikki 12/01

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