Nymphs singer Inger Lorre has died at the age of 61. The news was confirmed in a statement released by her label, Kitten Robot Records.
"We are saddened to say goodbye to our beloved friend and artist Inger Lorre," wrote the label. "Inger, born Lori Ann Wening, passed on October 16 from complications due to recently diagnosed cancer. Her mother, Lois Wening, had also passed on October 4; both are confirmed by Jen Wening, Inger’s sister.
"Inger was an accomplished singer, songwriter, recording artist, painter and a lover of animals. A singularly unique artist, both visually and musically, Inger first came to national attention with her band Nymphs, whose self-titled LP was released by Geffen Records in 1991.
"Her career as a solo artist began with Transcendental Medication' released by Triple X in 1999. Kitten Robot released her final album, Gloryland, just last year. Our condolences go out to Jen and her family and to her many friends and fans."
Lorre was born in Matawan, New Jersey, in 1963, where she formed the Nymphs in the early 1980s. The band moved to Los Angeles and caught the attention of Tom Zutaut, the A&R man who signed Guns N' Roses to Geffen and Mötley Crüe to Elektra.
Zutaut, who described Lorre as possessing "more passion than any female singer I've ever heard" and was convinced she would be a star, signed the band to Geffen before developing a famously fractious relationship with the singer. The Nymphs' self-titled first album – described as "astounding, enthralling, frightening, and empowering" by Classic Rock – came out in October 1991, with an EP, A Practical Guide to Astral Projection, released the following year.
Battling mental health issues and addiction, Lorre was fired by the band in late 1992. She would go on to record with Jeff Buckley – singing Angel Mine with him on the Jack Kerouac tribute album Kicks Joy Darkness, and again on Thief Without The Take, which appeared on her 1999 debut solo album Transcendental Medication. Also on that album was She's Not Your Friend, a song dissing Courtney Love, who'd included an answering machine message from Inger on Sassy, from Hole's 1991 album Pretty On The Inside.
Lorre's next album, Live At The Viper Room, didn't arrive until 2017, and her first studio album in 24 years, Glorybound, was released last year, after a long journey and self-discovery and self-improvement.
"It was really the fans that brought me back, because I’m still afraid of the industry, the corporate machine," Lorre told Classic Rock. "But you’ve got to keep it positive because the world is so freakin’ dark right now. I felt like I needed to help heal some of the sadness. It was climate change and covid, everyone was committing suicide, everyone on fentanyl. I don’t know if the world has ever been in a darker place. But there’s something about it where I just needed to hold on to hope.
"I thought I was completely forgotten, just a has-been train wreck, drug-addled loser that the industry had spit out. This has given me a whole new reason to live. I’ve always had a plan, and I don't have one now. I guess that’s the new plan. Just whatever life throws up. All opportunities are open, and we’ll take all the opportunities."
