1. Nina Hagen is known for her theatrical vocals and rise to prominence during the punk and Neue Deutsche Welle movements in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
39 Facts About Nina Hagen
1. 2.
Nina Hagen is known as "The Godmother of German Punk".
3.
In 1982, Nina Hagen signed a new contract with CBS and released her debut solo album NunSexMonkRock, which became her first record to chart in the United States.
4.
Nina Hagen followed it with two more albums: Fearless and Nina Hagen in Ekstasy, before her contract with CBS expired and was not renewed.
5.
Nina Hagen released three albums on the label: Nina Hagen, Street, and Revolution Ballroom.
6.
Nina Hagen made her musical comeback with the release of her album Return of the Mother.
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Nina Hagen wrote three autobiographies: Ich bin ein Berliner, Nina Hagen: That's Why the Lady Is a Punk, and Bekenntnisse.
8.
Nina Hagen is noted for her human and animal rights activism.
9.
Nina Hagen was born in what was then East Berlin, East Germany, the daughter of Hans Oliva-Hagen, a scriptwriter, and Eva-Maria Hagen, an actress and singer.
10.
Nina Hagen's parents divorced when she was two years old.
11.
When Nina Hagen was 11, her mother had a relationship with Wolf Biermann, an anti-establishment singer-songwriter.
12.
Nina Hagen later returned to Germany and joined the cover band Fritzens Dampferband, together with Achim Mentzel and others.
13.
Nina Hagen added songs by Janis Joplin and Tina Turner to the "allowable" set lists during shows.
14.
From 1972 to 1973, Nina Hagen enrolled in the vocal training performance program at The Central Studio for Light Music in East Berlin.
15.
Nina Hagen's label advised her to acclimatize herself to Western culture through travel, and she arrived in London during the height of the punk rock movement.
16.
Nina Hagen was quickly taken up by a circle that included The Slits.
17.
The other band members, sans Nina Hagen, soon developed a successful independent musical career as Spliff.
18.
Nina Hagen became infamous for an appearance on an Austrian evening talk show called Club 2, on 9 August 1979, on the topic of youth culture, when she demonstrated various female masturbation positions and became embroiled in a heated argument with other panelists, in particular, writer and journalist Humbert Fink.
19.
Nina Hagen acted with Dutch rocker Herman Brood and singer Lene Lovich in the 1979 film Cha Cha.
20.
Brood and Nina Hagen would have a long romantic relationship that would end when Nina Hagen could no longer tolerate Brood's drug abuse.
21.
Nina Hagen would refer to Brood as her "soulmate" long after Brood committed suicide in 2001.
22.
In late 1980, Nina Hagen discovered she was pregnant, broke up with the father-to-be Ferdinand Karmelk, and moved to Los Angeles.
23.
Nina Hagen's daughter, Cosma Shiva Hagen, was born in Santa Monica on 17 June 1981.
24.
In 1982, Nina Hagen released her first English-language album: NunSexMonkRock, a dissonant mix of punk, funk, reggae, and opera.
25.
Nina Hagen then went on a world-tour with the No Problem Orchestra.
26.
Nina Hagen performed songs from this album during the 1985 version of Rock in Rio.
27.
Simultaneously fashion photographer Hannes Schmid produced a Nina Hagen cover for German Cosmopolitan magazine.
28.
In 1989, Hagen released the album, Nina Hagen, which was backed up by another German tour.
29.
In 1992 Nina Hagen became the host of a TV show on RTLplus.
30.
Nina Hagen returned to San Francisco to star in another San Francisco Goethe Institut show, "Hannusen, Hitler's Jewish Clarvoyant".
31.
In 1997 she collaborated with German hip hop musician Thomas D In 1998, Hagen became the host of a weekly science fiction show on the British Sci-Fi Channel, in addition to embarking on another tour of Germany.
32.
Nina Hagen believes that the Hindu incarnation of Lord Vishnu known as Krishna was "the King of Jerusalem", and sometimes refers to Krishna as "Christ".
33.
Nina Hagen provided vocals to "Witness" and "Bereit" on KMFDM's Adios.
34.
Nina Hagen wrote the song "Handgrenade" on the album Return of the Mother for Christine Maggiore.
35.
On 14 October 2002 Nina Hagen hit Moscow by coming there with her concert, while interviews with the eccentric singer were aired on many TV-channels.
36.
Nina Hagen did a cover of Rammstein's "Seemann" with Apocalyptica.
37.
In 2005 Nina Hagen headlined the Drop Dead Festival in New York City.
38.
Nina Hagen was an active protester against the war in Iraq.
39.
The song "Punk Wedding" was written for the wedding and Nina Hagen described the event as a marriage between the punk and new age movements.