Nina Hagen rose to fame in early 1970s East Germany as an actor and musical theatre performer before escaping to West Germany mid-decade. Trained in the Weimar cabaret tradition of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill and gifted as an opera prodigy, she fused these roots with folk, psychedelic, glam, and punk influences from bands like Sex Pistols and The Slits after visiting London. Returning to Germany, she formed the Nina Hagen Band in 1977, pioneering a flamboyant visual and musical style that prefigured artists from Madonna and Cyndi Lauper to Lady Gaga and Chappell Roan. With a vocal range often compared to Yoko Ono and Maria Callas, Hagen has spent decades as a fearless, genre-defying artist and activist exploring themes from feminism and social justice to spirituality and UFOs. Everything young people are expressing presently Nina has been living for six decades.
On Highway To Heaven (Groenland Records), Nina Hagen returns not with nostalgia, but with conviction while channeling gospel through her singular, unruly voice. Drawing from legends like Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Mahalia Jackson, Hagen reshapes tradition into something vividly her own.
The title track, “There’s A Highway To Heaven,” soars with joyful urgency, while “Never Grow Old,” featuring Greek Pop singer, Nana Mouskouri, glows with a warm, earthy, tenderness. Elsewhere, Nina expertly covers the Loretta Lynn classic “Alle wollenin den Himmel / Everybody Wanna Go to Heaven”, “Dust on the Bible” surprises with a laid-back reggae sway, and “Somebody Prayed for Me” crackles with punk-edged intensity, proof that Hagen hasn’t lost her bite. On “Hand It Over,” a bluesy duet with Daniel Welbat, her voice digs deep, raw and resolute.
More than a covers album, Highway To Heaven feels like a testimony which is bold, eccentric, and deeply felt. Hagen doesn’t just interpret gospel; she inhabits it, turning reverence into revelation.
