At first listen, Klaus Nomi neophytes may have difficulty appreciating the juxtaposition of his Kabuki/New Wave/Opera music. But try again. Nomi’s strangely hypnotic melodies have won fans the world over, even 20 years after his death. Nomi only recorded two records and released another live album before his untimely death in 1983. Poetically enough, the movement that he had been such a major component of perished shortly after him, as the music industry began to embrace a more top 40 friendly version of New Wave.
Klaus Sperber was born on January 24, 1944 in West Germany. He moved to New York in 1977, changed his last name to Nomi (an anagram for Omni which was a science magazine he was fond of) and took the city that never sleeps by storm. But the quiet elfin, who loved to cook pastries, never peaked higher than performing with David Bowie on “Saturday Night Live”. After a few years of middling success, Nomi contracted the AIDS virus and died in 1983. It will never be known if he would have found the fame or love he seemed so desperate for, but filmmaker Andrew Horn has constructed a painstakingly meticulous and beautiful portrait of Nomi’s life in his new documentary “Nomi Song”. Not only does Horn’s film answer some of the questions Nomi fans have always wanted to ask, but it also recreates a time long since passed. Full of incredibly rare footage of Nomi and the city of New York itself, “Nomi Song” is not just a tribute to the enigmatic alien’s amazing talent, but it’s also a love letter to a musical movement that seems all but forgotten. After many years in the making, “Nomi Song” is now available on DVD through Palm Pictures. Andrew was kind enough to answer a few questions about his Teddy Award winning documentary.
Get the interview in part two of OUTER SPACE ANGEL>>>
