Christa Päffgen, better known as Nico started out as a model, doing shoots for Vogue and other popular publications in the early 1960’s. Andy Warhol placed her in some of his experimental films and introduced her to The Velvet Underground with whom she recorded the legendary ‘Banana’ album. She recorded several solo albums during the 70’s and 80’s and achieved a cult following though never making it to superstar status. She stuggled with herion abuse, coming clean in the late 1980’s. She collapsed while riding her bike in the hot sun during a stay on the isle of Ibiza. Cause of death was ruled a brain hemorrhage.Her ashes were buried in her mother’s grave in Berlin in a small cemetery in the Grunewald Forest at the edge of the Wannsee, on August 16, 1988, with a few friends playing a song from her album “Desertshore” on a cassette recorder.