1970 JANUARY -MARCH

do anymore she replied, in the deep Wagnerian accent, "No, who should London. She accompanies herself on a very ask me?! have a reputation for not turning up to sing. It's something! small Indian harmonium, and has 15 or 20 songs want verybadly to get rid of." of her own that she wants to record. She started But to get back to the beginning, a brief history: , born of a Polish composing a couple of years ago, and bought mother and a fatherwho died in the concentration camps, was a top the harmonium at just about the same time. Parisian cover girl before she met the Stones. She had no lessons About fouryears ago Brian Jones took her to ("Just singing lessons - Andy Warhol's Factory in NewYork, and she I wanted to be an opera joined , the group that "I can't stand singer since I was a very was part ofWarhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable little girl") and plays -the pioneering multi -media troupewhich used the instrument in a dancers plus the first -ever light show. the thought of uniquely delicate style, With them she sang at the Dom in NewYork, based on modes rather cut an for Verve, travelled across the than chords. States to Los Angeles in a bus (she and Sterling going to New "I don't want to play Morrison took turns driving), and played the in anymore clubs," Fillmore West to the accompaniment of some York, so I'm she says. "I'd like to do bad scenes with Bill Graham.After about a year concerts, and maybe she left the group to sing on her own, starting at colleges would be good. the Balloon Farm (upstairs from the Dom). Her flying to Ibiza" But I don't have a accompanists changed everyweek, but the manager, and nobody main ones were and from the Velvets and Jackson knows me here. In New York all theyoung people Browne, a young guitarist and singer from Orange County. know me... I have a lot of friends... but I hate New The upshot was that three of Browne's songs were on her first, badly York. Maybe ! should get a manager. I wouldn't produced album (for Verve), alongside Bob Dylan's "I'll Keep It With mind all the hassling if somebody else could go Mine", which legend says the master wrote for Nico, but of which she through it forme." simply declares, "I don't know about that. He just gave it to me." She was planning to fly to NewYork later the day That album, Chelsea Girl, was titled after a Warhol movie in which she that! saw her, possiblyto take up the option on appeared. She made another one with him, which he has never shown - herElektra contract. But a couple of hours after "Maybe it wasn't dirty enough forold New York. He could neverget me to we'd parted she rang to say that she'd changed her take my clothes off." mind. "I can't stand the thought of going to New There followed a long silence, broken a year ago by the appearance of York, so I'm flying to Ibiza. It's my favourite place, The Marblelndex, which is one of those records which just might, in 10 or and I think I'll die there." 20 years' time, be regarded as some sort of milestone. So perhaps those 15 beautiful songs will never Since then she's spent a lot of time in Italy, and has made part of a film be heard. But somehow ! think there's hope yet, even if London isn't ready called LaCicatriceInterieurewith the French director Philippe Garelle - for it. RichardWilliams "He's really one of the best movie -makers. He's directed five films, but he's never let them be released. This new one is very important tome. It's - MELODY MAKER JULY 25 - so powerful. We did part of it in theAmerican desert and part of it in the Egyptian desert... I don't knowwhen we'll THEVELVET UNDERGROUND AREALMOST a myth finish it. It doesn't matter; there's no hurry because to their fans. Up until now they have been a minority - it's a very timeless thing." appeal band, but those who have discovered them are But the most vital thing at the moment is to make invariably completely hung up on the quartet's bizarre a record, a task which amazingly defeated her in originality. John Cale was the Welsh voice who intoned Lou Reed's story of Marsha Bronson and Waldo Jeffers on "The Gift", and also the fingers behind the nerve -grating electric viola on "Venus In Furs". - MARCH 21 - He left the band after its second album, and is currentlyin Difficult, desolate London to produce the final stages of Nico's new album forJoe Boyd, which was begun a couple of months ago in New York. "Nico's so MM MARCH 28 qirn's rinital concert. powerful... very Germanic, very European," he told me. "I'm going to use a string orchestra on some tracks, and possibly a rock band on one cut. 11 THOUGHT THIS was a rock I'm making her singwithout her harmonium." and roll place," said Nico, John produced Nico's last LP, the mind- smiling between numbers at shatteringMarblelndex, which he told me was the Roundhouse last Sunday. recorded in two days- one forthe vocals and She was right, but she contrived harmonium, and one for the backings, which John to transcend barriers of taste overdubbed himself. One song left off that record, and finally left the stage to he says, sounded just like Jerry Lee Lewis. warm applause. More importantly for Cale's own point of view is Hers is difficult music. It's tonal the recent release in America of his own Columbia range circumscribed by the album, Vintage Violence, an extraordinary sound of the harmonium she compilation which, typically, is not at all what played and her intensely you'd expect. John says that some of the songs are personal, desolate delivery. "British" and some are "American" in tone, and The emotional range of these certainly the most exciting is the brilliantly interior monologues is, however, Nico,the arranged "Big White Cloud". unlimited, and among the most Welsh by birth, upbringing, and accent, memorable of the songs were John spent three years in London, notably at "My Empty Pages","No-one lonely Goldsmiths College, before the famous American Is There" and a new song, composerAaron Copeland got him a summer "In Her Native German". scholarship toAmerica'sTanglewood music school Richard Williams chanteuse through Leonard Bernstein. ppm suaveof the Velvet Underground s brat 48 IHISTORY OF ROCK 1970 Jalbum. wiz aced rued{When itrmail chanesuse." Notjug inger.- bocaus Mere thanInst.And NiceIt . I. h*word