ANDREW LOOG OLDHAM, the manager of the Rolling Stones and producer of Nico's first single:

My Nico story is a short one but, like her life, it's reasonably star-studded. Brian Jones brought Nico over from Paris, where she was modelling, in 1965 and said: "How about recording my friend too?" I'd already been through it with Marianne Faithfull, and I thought that I could tell who could sing just by hearing their speaking voice — and what a voice Nico had.

I sent her to John Paul Jones and Jimmy Page to audition; they thought she was quite something, totally scrumptious. We weren't used to this European allure. She was no doormat. She was a lethal woman. She was one of a new breed of woman, like Anita Pallenberg and Yoko Ono, who could have been a man. Like Carla Bruni is today. Far better that than the silly little English teacups around at that time.

We got it all wrong on the record, though, I'm Not Sayin'. I made the mistake of recording her with a big orchestra. It was a Gordon Lightfoot song and it just didn't swing. Decca rejected it and I hated it. It was in the wrong key, her voice sounded like a horse on steroids. But the B-side, The Last Mile, written by Jimmy Page, was good. [My label] Immediate Records put it out and we did a tour of the all the recording factories around the country. She was a trouper, a real laugh. They all loved her on the factory floor.

We were a stepping stone for her but happy to be one. All the drugs and darkness came later. When I worked with her she was pure Harvey Nichols, and wonderful for it. Well done, Brian, he certainly knew how to pick 'em.

"I'm Not Sayin'":





"The Last Mile":





Full article (by John Cale) here:

[entertainment.timesonline.co.uk]

BTW Brian supposedly played guitar on "The Last Mile" alongside Page.

Thanks, Glam.

Brian and Nico at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967......

Apparently she endured Brian's darkest side during their on/off time together during 1965 - 67.

I didn't know who she was at the time but I once met Nico in a hospital in Manchester, England around about the late 70's/ early eighties - I was visiting my then girlfriend who was in for some tests and she said the woman in the nearby bed on the same ward was a bit "weird" and everyone was a little unsure about her - she had hardly spoken to anyone and was in hospital, they reckoned, for either an overdose or some related drugs problem. Well, I turned up to visit my missus wearing my usual Stones tongue logo t-shirt and this blonde woman saw the tongue and beckoned me over to her bedside. It turned out she was a great Stones fan like myself and we had a nice chat - she was thoroughly charming and lovely... I felt a liitle sorry for her in that obvious predicament. It turned out that the lady was Nico. The Stones connection was made.

"...till the next time..."

Star

Nico spent the last years of her life living with John Cooper Clarke...



ROCKMAN

Going to the Nico Tribute show in London next week.