Nina Hagen is a woman of many passions. Gospel is one of them. In 2010 she released her first theme album with PERSONAL JESUS. With her version of the title track she managed to create one of the most interesting Depeche Mode cover versions because she played the song that everyone knows in such a way that hardly anyone recognized it.
The album back then had a strict black and white look, HIGHWAY TO HEAVEN offers the colors of the rainbow. What Nina Hagen wants to express with this: old hippie dreams live in gospel. Which leads directly to self-irony: When Nina Hagen sings the Southern gospel standard “Never Grow Old” in a duet with her heroine Nana Mouskouri on fiddle and steel guitar and in three-four time, it is very touching.
The title track features another of her idols, Gitte Haenning. On “Alle Wannen in den Himmel” she interweaves the county gospel “Everybody Wants Go To Heaven” with Bertolt Brecht, on “Trouble Of The World” Nina Hagen sounds like Grace Jones. Everything is very entertaining, although the record, with reggae, blues or boogie-woogie influences, scratches the limits of what is bearable.
