The Nixe

Originally posted March 17, 2010
“Looking back, it's easy to see what made The Nixe such an attractive proposition at the time. First and foremost they personified the 'anyone can do it' spirit of punk rock without a hint of pretence or career mindedness. Plus they also attracted a diverse crowd because they were never as aggressive and unapproachable as the male punk bands.” Jeroen Vedder

 
The Nixe – Live at Tivoli & Interview (Utreg, 1981)

“Because our boys were in the Lullabies from the end of 1978 and we got bored when they were away rehearsing we decided to start our own band. We asked Bunny [Nikki's best friend] but she didn’t want to. So Ilva asked Marian who was her best friend since they were babies. Marian could play 'Smoke on the water' and 'The House of the Rising Sun' on guitar which made her a guitar virtuoso in our opinion. I decided to play bass cause I thought it was easy and Ilva, being even more lazy than I was, decided to sing.” Nikki Meijerink

The Nixe, 1979. Pic by Jeroen “Buffel” Meijerink

“Nice detail: I never tuned my bass myself, cause I was bad at that. So one of my male friends always did that for me. For this gig [The Pink Saturday in Den Bosch] I had to do it myself. I was in tune but just one octave too high which made the top of my fingers bleed and my strings almost bend the neck of my guitar… so far feminism…” Nikki Meijerink

Nikki and her bass, ca 1979. Pic by Jeroen “Buffel” Meijerink

“Marian said yes immediately… Now we only had a drummer problem. Being with three girls we really wanted a girl and there we hadn’t met other punk girls yet in Utreg so when Ilva and I were walking through town one day we saw a gorgeous little punk girl (just 15 years old) waiting at a bus stop. We attacked her screaming and yelling and asked her if she wanted to be a drummer in our band. Though she never even touched a drumstick she said yes and we told her to come to our rehearsal place soon because we had our first gig two weeks later. And so it happened. We rehearsed two times and did our gig in De Baas. It was a complete mess but great even though I don’t remember much of it being too drunk…” Nikki Meijerink

The Nixe playing live, ca 1979. From left to right: Nikki, Marian and Ilva. 
Pic by Jeroen “Buffel” Meijerink

“The Nixe had the most gigs outside Utreg. I don’t know why. We really didn’t make the best music but we were girls of course and that was special and besides that we were funny… The first year we had a Ford Transit Van to go to our gigs. We usually played with 2 or 3 bands at a time. That means that we had the whole equipment and about 10 to 15 people in the backside of the van. Can you believe that!!! We were really on top of each other… fighting for air… Later when there were too many people wanted to come with us we hired trucks. The kind that was meant to transport cattle… they were the cheapest. It’s amazing we never had accidents with it. There was no door at the back, just a sailcloth, and if one of the guys needed to piss they just did it out of the back… on the highway… while they were drunk as hell… Miracle we never lost one… I think…” Nikki Meijerink

Simone sitting in the back of the cattle van, ca 1980. Pic by Jeroen “Buffel” Meijerink

“The Nixe EP we recorded in some small studio in Zwolle I think but we have also been to some studio nearer to Utreg maybe for the LP we made with the Lullabies, the Bizon Kids, ZeroZero and the Rapers. In both cases Gert van Veen helped us to produce the thing. Gert van Veen was singer and keyboard player in a couple of bands from Utreg like the Hi Jinx and the Secret Sounds. He is now in Quazar, a houseact. He studied musicology and worked as a music reviewer for de Volkskrant. He liked the Utreg Punx scene a lot and did everything he could to help us.
   I don’t remember how much it costed us but not much I’m sure. And I think we made a 1000 copies but it could also be 500. We didn’t have money to buy the covers. Ilva and Marian were at that point both working as kindergarten teachers. They first let all the toddlers make nice drawings on folding sheets. Yes I admit… Childlabor… quilty as charged… And when these poor little toddlers were tired of it we started to do the rest ourselves. It took a whole night but some bottles of wodka, pizza, amphetamines and music made us go through it… I don’t have any one but on the My Space Nixe page there are some people that do have them. Really funny. On the most we just wrote 'The Nixe' but as it got later we just wrote or draw on it what came up to us so some of it just say 'I want pizza' or 'wodka' or 'I want to go home'…” Nikki Meijerink

One of the many handmade Nixe EP covers.

 “We disbanded the Nixe in March 1984. No fights or musical disagreements or anything. Just because we got bored with it, I guess. We were no musicians and our music making didn’t make much progress through these 4,5 years. It was OK for that time but now it was time to move on…” Nikki Meijerink 

VA Utreg Punx 7" (Rock Against Records, 1980)

The Nixe –You Say
Get it here.

The Nixe The Nixe 7" EP (Rock Against Records, 1981)

The Nixe – Searching
Get it here.

More info here and here. Also, if you happen to visit Utreg in the following months, please don't hesitate to visit this exhibition.

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Excerpts taken from an interview with Nikki Meijerink in October 2011. It will be published in its full-length in the second issue of Making Waves – to be released soon.