Nina Hagen – New York New York – Rock in Rio 1985

Live performance, featuring Bill Liesegang. A European tour with a new band in 1980 was cancelled, and Nina turned to the New World. A limited-edition US album was released on vinyl that summer: one side contained two English-language songs, and the B side was two tracks from Unbehagen. In the fall of 1980, Hagen discovered she was pregnant, broke up with the father-to-be, and moved to Los Angeles. Her daughter, Cosma Shiva Hagen, was born in Santa Monica on May 17, 1981. In 1982, Hagen released her first solo album NunSexMonkRock, a dissonant mix of punk, funk, reggae, and opera, and went on a world tour with the No Problem Orchestra. In 1983 came the album Angstlos and a minor European tour. By this time, Hagen’s public appearances were becoming stranger and frequently included discussions of God, UFOs, her social and political beliefs, animal rights and vivisection and claims of alien sightings. The English version of Angstlos, Fearless, generated two major club hits in America , Zarah (a cover of the Zarah Leander song Ich weiss, es wird einmal ein Wunder geschehen) and the disco/punk/opera classic, New York New York. 1985’s Nina Hagen In Ekstasy fared less well, but did generate club hits with “Universal Radio” and a cover of “Spirit In The Sky” and also featured a 1979 recording of her hardcore punk take on Frank Sinatra’s My Way, which had been one of her signature live tunes in previous years. Her contract with CBS over, she released the Punk Wedding EP …
Video Rating: 4 / 5