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Desertshore is another of those great albums that hover around the half-hour mark and put to shame most of the CDs nowadays that run some 50-70 minutes long. In 1969, Nico enlisted the services of recently departed Velvet Underground multi-instrumentalist John Cale to arrange her material. The result, The Marble Index, was quite a rupture in her musical career. Prior to that, in her early pop attempts which had included a charming cover of Gordon Lightfoot's "I'm Not Saying," up through her auxiliary role in the V.U. and her later Polydor debut with Chelsea Girls, the music she sung had been carefully selected and fitted to her like so many of the clothing and accessories she probably paraded around as a high-glamour European model and film actress. Marble Index, however, announced her own true vision, aggressively facilitated by the classical training of Cale. Desertshore largely takes the style introduced with Marble Index and refines it further. The results are a more accessible and personal album the second time around. With the arrival of such an uncommercial product as Index, Nico would pretty much be bounced around from label to label on an album-by-album basis for the remainder of her music career. First stop: Reprise Records and Joe Boyd. That Joe Boyd saw something of appeal in Nico and Cale's approach is probably no surprise, given that he produced The Incredible String Band's seminal albums of the late 60s. This music adheres to much of the same principles: intimate arrangements entirely self-played on acoustic instruments. At certain points, Nico's vocal cadenzas on "The Falconer" remind one of Robin Williamson's, and contrast the a capella hymnal "My Only Child" with the ISB's "Mountain of God" on The Big Huge. I would probably bet that for the most part the lyrics on this album are probably freely associated ones, the phrases chosen for their sound quality with no deeper meaning intended. And yet, the Freudian in me can't help but offer some further analysis. I've always interpreted the album to be about Nico's relationship with her then 8-year old son Ari (a.k.a. Ari Boulogne, Ari Päffgen). I think of the documentary "Nico: Icon" made several years ago, which makes the case with pretty firm conviction that Nico was neglectful, ill-suited to the role of motherhood. Lutz Ulbricht (Agitation Free), at one point shakes his head at the fact that a mother could turn her own son onto heroin, and the documentary also reveals a disturbing anecdote that when Ari once fell into a coma, Nico's response simply was to record his heart beat to use for her next album. At the same time, it is also suggested that there was a very close bond between mother and son that could not be captured in words and anecdotes. Well, the lyrics of Desertshore seem to reflect these opposite impulses. "Janitor of Lunacy" thematically suggests overtones of an abortion or desired sterility. Its verses are structured like a warped, religious prayer, with Nico's peculiar rendering of English: "Paralyze my infancy," "Petrify the empty cradle," "Seal the giving of their seed," "Disease the breathing grief," "Forgive their begging scream." One also thinks of the album's photos of Nico wandering a barren desert, taken from the film "La Cicatrice Intérieure" ("The Interior Scar"), directed by her lover Philippe Garrel. The rejection of "Janitor of Lunacy" is contrasted sharply with the encouragement and love that seems to underly the parental-child relationship of "My Only Child," and the maternal devotion and attachment of "Mütterlein." There is also ambiguity throughout the album that increases its mystery. Is "Mütterlein" Nico addressing her own mother (who died in 1970), or perhaps is it her writing wishfully through her son's eyes? Maybe a bit of both? On "Afraid," the most conventional but perhaps the most luminescent track on the album, when Nico sings "You are beautiful/and you are alone...", is she singing to Ari (i.e., again, an expression of both her love of him and rejection of motherhood)... or is she singing to herself (i.e., the glamorous model who never could shake her isolation from others)? "Le Petit Chevalier" (The Little Knight) features Ari himself, singing a nursery rhyme-like lyric in French, with an accompanying harpsichord. This one minute track always creeps me out listening to it. Even though I know Ari is still alive, it still makes you feel as if you're listening to the voice of a deceased child. Are his final lines ("J'irai te visiter..." which means "I shall visit you") intended to be tenderness or retribution? I find that Marble Index has higher peaks and is the more daring and groundbreaking album, but Desertshore is the more consistent one, with uniformly great material, and I personally like it more. In any case, both are terrific albums. So enter Nico's chapel of tears and enjoy. review by Joe McGlinchey — 10-31-05 —