stooges to record new album with steve albini

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― stoogey, Friday, 3 March 2006 14:17 (nineteen years ago)

If it's good it will be good!

― Chewshabadoo (Chewshabadoo), Friday, 3 March 2006 14:20 (nineteen years ago)

So, Watt on bass then?

― Dave will do (dave225.3), Friday, 3 March 2006 14:26 (nineteen years ago)

i'm going to predict that this will not be as incredibly cosmically orgasmic as i hope it will be. PLZ PROVE ME WRONG BOYS.

― wangdangsweetpentangle (teenagequiet), Friday, 3 March 2006 14:33 (nineteen years ago)

Chew OTM

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:02 (nineteen years ago)

i am beging them - please don't do this.

― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:28 (nineteen years ago)

No, do it. What is there to lose?

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:30 (nineteen years ago)

it will suck and make us sad.

― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:31 (nineteen years ago)

if it does, it won't be albini's fault

― electric sound of jim (and why not) (electricsound), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:32 (nineteen years ago)

it will be somewhat his fault.

― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:34 (nineteen years ago)

I liked this comment on that link:

This will be The Godfather 3 of Stooges albums.

Hopefully not though.

That's about my feeling!

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:35 (nineteen years ago)

How good were the three Stooges tracks on Skull Ring (the title track, "Little Electric Chair" and one other)? I never heard the album, only saw them perform the former two live at Roseland, and they weren't much different from filler tracks on any Iggy solo disc from, say, American Caesar on. Just with a more namecheckable backing band. So those of you hoping for Back To The Funhouse are, I fear, gonna get hosed by reality.

― pdf (Phil Freeman), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:36 (nineteen years ago)

I don't think anybody seriously expects it can be as good as those first three, but it could still be better than a lot of Iggy's solo albums...

― StanM (StanM), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:36 (nineteen years ago)

... I hope.

― StanM (StanM), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:37 (nineteen years ago)

Well, that's kind of what I mean.

If it's good/great, it's a return and an addition to the canon.

If it's average/poor/terrible, it detracts not from the first three albums.

xpost.

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:38 (nineteen years ago)

xpost - haha yeah i just caught that and it sums up the situation about as perfectly as it could. it's not going to be very good.

"little electric chair" was pretty all right but they sounded like a stooges cover band for the most part - which i guess they are at this point really

― wangdangsweetpentangle (teenagequiet), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:38 (nineteen years ago)

Maybe it's naive of me to be so excited. Honestly I don't have very high hopes. But you know those nights when you're sitting around getting fucked up and everyone agrees that you could only possibly listen to the Stooges but you've already listened to all the albums twice and even Lust for Life so you just give up and pass out? Those nights can be 30 minutes longer now!!

― ghost dong (Sonny A.), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:48 (nineteen years ago)

But you know those nights when you're sitting around getting fucked up and everyone agrees that you could only possibly listen to the Stooges

I'm trying to imagine house parties that run on this principle.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:49 (nineteen years ago)

This will be about half as good as the new Mudhoney record right?

― NickB (NickB), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:49 (nineteen years ago)

i can't possibly be the only one who's been in that situation 1000 times ??

― ghost dong (Sonny A.), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:50 (nineteen years ago)

This would be incredible exciting in 1995.

― Eppy (Eppy), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:56 (nineteen years ago)

It would also be incredibly exciting if I spelled things right, argh.

― Eppy (Eppy), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:56 (nineteen years ago)

"stooges to record new album with xenomania" would have been an infinitely more interesting prospect.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:57 (nineteen years ago)

xpost ghost:

Is that the same party where you suddely realise none of you left at the house party actually live there ('anymore' optional)

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 3 March 2006 15:58 (nineteen years ago)

I think the tunes on Skull Ring were recorded before they hooked up with Watt or at least he didn't play on them. They have been playing shows together on and off for a few years now, so maybe this bodes well. I haven't seen or heard any of their reunion shows, but people seem to have liked them going by the articles I have read. The Mission of Burma and Rocket from the Tombs recordings turned out OK, so who knows.

Back in the early 90s, I always figured that Al Jorgensen would eventually get around to recording something with Iggy singing, but it never happened.

― Earl Nash (earlnash), Friday, 3 March 2006 17:41 (nineteen years ago)

iggy pop cant write good tunes anymore for 20 years at least, so there's no way it will be good.
though the playing and production will be great, cause "skull ring" was awfuly produced,but good played.now it will be good-produced too.

to my humble opinion.

― ddd@www, Friday, 3 March 2006 17:45 (nineteen years ago)

The music on "Little Electric Chair" was fucking amazing, but Iggy was overpoetic. It's really up to Pop as to whether or not this album satisfies. I have no doubt whether Ron Asheton will provide an awesome backdrop.

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 3 March 2006 17:48 (nineteen years ago)

unless Iggy is back to chasing bucketloads of barbituates with an ounce of coke, what can we expect?

― Space Is the Place (Space Is the Place), Friday, 3 March 2006 17:49 (nineteen years ago)

The Stooges were terrific live in NYC. I didn't love the live-in-Detroit DVD, but live music on DVD/video frequently bores/irritates me. I feel obligated to sit still and watch, which is antithetical to the spirit of what I'm watching most of the time. Anyway, maybe the album'll be good. I want it to be. I just don't hold out much hope, since there have been so many examples of bands falling down on the job.

― pdf (Phil Freeman), Friday, 3 March 2006 17:54 (nineteen years ago)

I'm afraid that the biggest impediment will be Scott Asheton…in his mid '50s, he was the plodder of all plodderers when I saw 'em live in 2003 and 2004. Given albini's vaunted recording ethic, the album will likely…plod.

― veronica moser (veronica moser), Friday, 3 March 2006 19:41 (nineteen years ago)

I saw Scotty swing hard at their first reunion gig at Coachella, so I dunno what VM is talking about. Iggy demands a lot, doesn't settle for stuff with Stooges. Check Watt's tour diaries to see the regimen up close. The Junior Kimbrough covers were ferocious (and the first new Stooges recordings w/ Watt on bass, he wasn't present for Skull Ring stuff): check em.

― JayBabcock (jabbercocky), Friday, 3 March 2006 19:55 (nineteen years ago)

oh god ... i'm so fucking scared. somebody hold me.

― Cameron Octigan (Cameron Octigan), Friday, 3 March 2006 19:56 (nineteen years ago)

The songs on Skull Ring were OK, but the one recent track that got me excited was their first version of "You Better Run" on the Junior Kimbrough tribute "Sunday Nights". Everything was blazing here-guitar, drums, vocals, lyrics. If the new one is anything like this, admittedly a cover, it will be hot.

― Matt Carlson (mattsoncarlhew), Saturday, 4 March 2006 18:15 (nineteen years ago)

This is just a rumor and not a fact so I'll believe it when I see (or hear) it.

Wasn't there talk that Rick Rubin expressed interest in producing the Stooges too?

― Jeff K (jeff k), Saturday, 4 March 2006 18:25 (nineteen years ago)

"stooges to record new album with xenomania" would have been an infinitely more interesting prospect.
Marcello OTM. Albini is such a boring choice

― snowballing (snowballing), Saturday, 4 March 2006 18:32 (nineteen years ago)

The Stooges in 2006 :
http://www.toutsurlacom.com/files//Article/2006/20060202SFR.mpg

― snowballing (snowballing), Saturday, 4 March 2006 18:53 (nineteen years ago)

I just don't think we have anything to fear, here. I mean if it isn't mind blowing, I can't see how it can be all that bad, either. The 2005 show I saw was a real highlight of my lifetime. (thanks Devo for cancelling, or it never would have happened)

― Bimble The Nimble (Bimble...), Saturday, 4 March 2006 21:57 (nineteen years ago)

they should have got phil spector

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Saturday, 4 March 2006 22:02 (nineteen years ago)

I think the tunes on Skull Ring were recorded before they hooked up with Watt or at least he didn't play on them.

The band was, sort of, Asheton-Asheton-Watt-Mascis before Iggy came in and they called it the Stooges, so the latter.

― kit brash (kit brash), Saturday, 4 March 2006 23:12 (nineteen years ago)

Can we play the first album again, please?

― Bimble The Nimble (Bimble...), Saturday, 4 March 2006 23:29 (nineteen years ago)

one month passes...

More on this.

― Je4nn3 Æ’urÂ¥ (Je4nne Fury), Tuesday, 18 April 2006 18:13 (nineteen years ago)

always encouraging to hear someone say they've "pretty much run out of ideas"/

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 18 April 2006 18:26 (nineteen years ago)

i dunno, it's kind of refreshing to hear Iggy be so honest about his reasons for returning to the Stooges. Maybe his buds Lou Reed and David Bowie should come out and say the same thing? But an Albini produced Stooges record? Why not? Sounds fun! At least Albini will just record 'em live and get a good drum and guitar sound. What else is required?

― Tyler W (tylerw), Tuesday, 18 April 2006 18:59 (nineteen years ago)

some fucking gut-wrenching angst

― pssst - badass revolutionary art! (plsmith), Tuesday, 18 April 2006 19:09 (nineteen years ago)

oh, ig's still got that--didn't you see his "behind the music" a few years back? he's a tortured soul!

― Tyler W (tylerw), Tuesday, 18 April 2006 19:15 (nineteen years ago)

just say no

― dr lulu (dr lulu), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 00:40 (nineteen years ago)

psychedelic geezers unite!

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 00:43 (nineteen years ago)

they were SO good when I saw them in january, total onslaught from start to finish. if the riffs are good, it might just be enough.

― lil' merzbow wow (haitch), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 03:29 (nineteen years ago)

i hope they get some good guests to collab with like sting & carlos sant!

― shredding repis on the gnar gnar rad (chaki), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 03:35 (nineteen years ago)

it says jack white will produce some tracks too. would have been nice if it was just one producer i think but i suppose JW will sell it more

― okok, Wednesday, 19 April 2006 08:12 (nineteen years ago)

Jon Williams? Oh right...

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 08:31 (nineteen years ago)

jon should totally guest star

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Wednesday, 19 April 2006 08:37 (nineteen years ago)

five months pass...

They're making the album right now.
Mike Watt shares the details, minute by minute.
They're covering "I Wanna Be Your Man"(!).

― Mike Dixn (Mike Dixon), Friday, 13 October 2006 01:44 (nineteen years ago)

three months pass...

I've just received the new Stooges album and, provided you're not expecting The Beginning Of Time, it's a goodie...

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 15 January 2007 09:15 (nineteen years ago)

(in brackets.. The first two albums have their share of 'clunker' tracks, so is what yr saying is although there isn't one *pow* track like "I wanna be yr dog" or "1970 (feel alright)", the quality does not waver downward badly. Heck, just reading the lyrics you quoted is good enough!)

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 15 January 2007 10:01 (nineteen years ago)

If anyone was going to do a song about trolling then it really had to be the Ig.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 15 January 2007 10:12 (nineteen years ago)

Ha ha, I held the master in mine own hands last year.

― The Long Grey And Overcast Tea Time Of The Soul (kate), Monday, 15 January 2007 12:36 (nineteen years ago)

They call Iggy 'the master'???

― NickB (NickB), Monday, 15 January 2007 12:39 (nineteen years ago)

No, I wouldn't touch that, I know where it's been.

― The Long Grey And Overcast Tea Time Of The Soul (kate), Monday, 15 January 2007 12:39 (nineteen years ago)

...which is probably more than he could say, I guess.

― NickB (NickB), Monday, 15 January 2007 12:51 (nineteen years ago)

Judging from that review it sounds very promising. The pessimist inside me was expecting nothing more than a late period Iggy solo album with the Ashetons as his backing band. Obviously, that is clearly not the case.

So it is definitely a Stooges album then?

― Jeff K (jeff k), Monday, 15 January 2007 15:13 (nineteen years ago)

Phew. They've gotten rid of (most of) Ron's third reich background and other images.

http://www.myspace.com/iggyandthestooges

Yeah yeah, he's "just a fan of the symbolism and not a nazi at all" but I'd rather not know, to be honest.

― StanM (StanM), Monday, 15 January 2007 15:31 (nineteen years ago)

Without a doubt; it may be that Albini put his foot down to make sure they played as a band but they sound generally enthusiastic about the whole thing and fuse together quite brilliantly (xpost).

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Monday, 15 January 2007 15:37 (nineteen years ago)

hey marcello,

thx for posting the review...i enjoyed reading it.

i don't know whether to thank you, though, or curse you for getting my expectations up : )i've been trying to stay really negative on this so i don't get disappointed...which was hard, esp. after i heard albini was producing it....

but yeah anyway, that review made it sound great.

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 15 January 2007 15:42 (nineteen years ago)

New song up http://www.myspace.com/iggyandthestooges

Uh. I think it's pretty lame.

― Mr. Que (Mr.Que), Monday, 29 January 2007 12:36 (nineteen years ago)

hmm. ron and "rock" sound pretty good but WTF @ iggy's voice.

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Monday, 29 January 2007 13:23 (nineteen years ago)

This wasn't one of the better ones live, either. I mean, those lyrics are sub-Slayer retarded.

― Spine Swine (Roger Fidelity), Monday, 29 January 2007 14:37 (nineteen years ago)

music sounds great. vox i dunno.

― M@tt He1g3s0n: oh u mad cuz im stylin on u (Matt Helgeson), Monday, 29 January 2007 16:47 (nineteen years ago)

I think the music sounds great as well. Vox are okay at best. I know the lyrics aren't supposed to be super sophisticated or anything, but they are kind of lame, imo. However, I did listen to this song on repeat for a while, so I guess that's a good sign.

― Harpal (harpal), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 03:31 (nineteen years ago)

i guess my feelings about this song come down to this:

if this is one of the 2 or 3 worst songs on the record, i'm excited

if this is one of the 2 or 4 best songs on the record, i'm really worried.

― M@tt He1g3s0n: oh u mad cuz im stylin on u (Matt Helgeson), Wednesday, 31 January 2007 18:14 (nineteen years ago)

yep. agreed on that one.

― Mr. Que (Mr.Que), Wednesday, 31 January 2007 18:17 (nineteen years ago)

three weeks pass...

To all my other favourite bands from the past: please do not make new music when you reunite. Listen to this album if you want to know why.

― StanM, Thursday, 22 February 2007 12:14 (eighteen years ago)

yeah, the record is very bad
, a low point both for steve albini and for iggy pop

― Zeno, Thursday, 22 February 2007 20:25 (eighteen years ago)

A low point for the engineer? Is it recorded that badly?

― Edward III, Thursday, 22 February 2007 20:35 (eighteen years ago)

Yes, it is. Unless The Stooges specifically told Albini to record it like this.

― Harpal, Thursday, 22 February 2007 20:37 (eighteen years ago)

"Unless The Stooges specifically told Albini to record it like this"

still,where is the "artisitic integrity"?!
gone with the paycheck?

― Zeno, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:06 (eighteen years ago)

Anybody wanna e-mail me with a PR contact for this thingy?

― unperson, Thursday, 22 February 2007 21:12 (eighteen years ago)

Artistic integrity? Albini's a gun for hire. You give him money, he sets up microphones and records your shit as faithfully as he can. If recorded what was going on in the studio competently then I don't see how it's a low point.

― Edward III, Thursday, 22 February 2007 22:17 (eighteen years ago)

Well, I think it's terrific. If you're expecting another Funhouse, forget about it. But if you lower your high expectations a little you'll find a high energized, hard rocking album that doesn't take itself too seriously. The Asheton brothers have never been recorded better, the sound just explodes from the speakers. It's the only Stooges album in which Iggy's vocals are mixed way down and I think that's putting some people off. I'm not disapointed one bit.

― Jeff K, Saturday, 24 February 2007 23:21 (eighteen years ago)

Not heard the album yet, but: vocals mixed way down, lots of guitar, live sound . . that'd be an Albini recording all right.

I'm sure I remember Albini enthusing about the Stooges, as distinct from the 'Iggy Pop sound experience', in Forced Exposure fifteen years ago. Be surprised if he was phoning this one in.

― Soukesian, Sunday, 25 February 2007 11:37 (eighteen years ago)

I think Shakespeare said something about a new Stooges album, something about "To Suck or Not To Suck Arse".

― Bimble, Sunday, 25 February 2007 13:29 (eighteen years ago)

Now, that would have been a better title. Stick it in a crude monchrome cover like a 70's vinyl bootleg, and you'd have the perfect package.

― Soukesian, Sunday, 25 February 2007 13:37 (eighteen years ago)

That Iggy and the Stooges live in Cincinnati in 1970 footage on youtube that is linked to in the N.Y. Times interview/feature is pretty awesome.

Ben Ratliff feb 25 2007 NY Times article

video

Jack Rabid interviews Iggy in the new Spin.

― curmudgeon, Sunday, 25 February 2007 14:29 (eighteen years ago)

"Free and Freaky":

http://www.stereogum.com/archives/004712.html

― Tim Ellison, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 17:04 (eighteen years ago)

New reductio ad absurdum/ ILX descriptor: "So contrarian they like that shitty new Stooges album."

― M.V., Tuesday, 27 February 2007 17:36 (eighteen years ago)

You might as well be saying, "So contrarian they like 'Yummy Yummy Yummy'" because that song is great.

― Tim Ellison, Tuesday, 27 February 2007 17:46 (eighteen years ago)

Bump. No other comments on "Free and Freaky?"

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 21:43 (eighteen years ago)

It's the only Stooges album in which Iggy's vocals are mixed way down and I think that's putting some people off.

people want these vocals to be LOUDER? no thx iggz.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 21:44 (eighteen years ago)

The Stooges (a band that existed between 1968 and 1974 or so) mean more to me than is entirely reasonable. While I don't listen to them as often as I once did and no longer view the world through Stooge-colored lenses all the time, they're still near and dear. Hell, I even love a lot of Iggy's solo stuff. What I'm tying to say is that I'm more inclined than most to cut this nu-Stooge some slack...

And I can't. There's no slack to be had. They've apparently stolen all the slack and made a bunch of bad songs out of it.

― Pye Poudre, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 23:16 (eighteen years ago)

forget albini's trying-to-capture-the-real-sound thing and jack white's thing (whatever that is). these dudes are way too old and don't have the fire to rock hard without totally tweaking the sound. they should've had it produced by the guy who did the old sick things recordings or high rise or air conditioning. that way, they'd have a million decibels of feedback and distortion covering up the fact that they're old and tired. that's just my take and yea, i have a copy of the new record. it sounds like bar rock to me.

― QuantumNoise, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 23:43 (eighteen years ago)

damn, i sound so upset. i'm not really.

― QuantumNoise, Wednesday, 28 February 2007 23:44 (eighteen years ago)

I haven't listened yet, but the most striking thing to me in most of the commentary I've read is that people's expectations are so high for this.
As much as I love the Stooges and Mike Watt as personalities, music-wise, I'd have to go back to the 2nd or 3rd Firehose album to find anything by any of them I've felt was worth keeping. And Watt's not even given the honor of appearing in the press photos. So I assume his input was around zilch.

― Mike Dixn, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:03 (eighteen years ago)

I do think it can be too easy to project "tiredness" on to older performers. I don't hear that on "Free and Freaky" at all.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:06 (eighteen years ago)

What I do hear is something akin to this guy:

http://image.listen.com/img/356x237/0/1/4/4/564410_356x237.jpg

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:11 (eighteen years ago)

wow if this actually sounds like AWK I will totally love it!

I briefly debated buying tix to see them after seeing the full page ad for the tour in the SF Weekly...

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:17 (eighteen years ago)

Just to clarify, I'm only talking about "Free and Freaky" (link above). Haven't heard the whole album

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:20 (eighteen years ago)

I gotta say I do kinda love the press photo up at stereogum

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:22 (eighteen years ago)

its does sound kinda like awk in terms of the layered anthem-pop approach. in fact, i was going to suggest awk as a hypothetical producer. but it doesn't have any of awk's intensity or mania or over-the-top theatrical splendor. i dunno. that chorus is kinda silly and easy, "Free and freaky in the USA!" hey! let's go! i mean, these dudes are suppose to be mean. and here they are sounding like a car commercial appealing to aging rockers who need to buy a sport car during the midlife crisis.

of course, older folks are allowed to reinvent themselves, but at the same time, after hearing scott walker's new stuff. it's hard not to raise the bar high for other dudes from the late 60s and early 70s.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:28 (eighteen years ago)

and here they are sounding like a car commercial appealing to aging rockers who need to buy a sport car during the midlife crisis.

well they already cornered the retirees-on-a-cruise market

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:30 (eighteen years ago)

i mean, these dudes are suppose to be mean.

Naw, have you read I Want More? There was the meditational/macrobiotic side to the (Psychedelic) Stooges. Iggy writes at one point about how Dave Alexander took his acoustic guitar and painted it psychedelic.

You're right that "Free and Freaky" doesn't have the mania of AWK, but, for me, Iggy makes up for it with his lyrics.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:32 (eighteen years ago)

those lyrics are cool, and i'm still digesting them. i think the verses are better than that chorus though.

man, have you ever been on a macrobiotic diet? it can make a man mean and bitter ;)

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:37 (eighteen years ago)

nothing more than a late period Iggy solo album with the Ashetons as his backing band

This is exactly what it is. Somewhere between Instinct and Beat 'Em Up, to be exact.

― unperson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:38 (eighteen years ago)

hey! let's go!

It's not "Hey! Let's go!" though. It's "People make me nervous/Pretty soon, they leave me alone."

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:56 (eighteen years ago)

i didn't put the hey! let's go! in quotes. it was referring to the peppy, go team, rah rah rock vibe they're doing during that chorus.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 00:59 (eighteen years ago)

I know, I'm just questioning the "team" implication given the line I quoted.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 01:38 (eighteen years ago)

yeah, iggy is giving us the iggy-thing: leave-me-alone alienation. but the stooges musically are suppose to makes us FEEL that alienation. they're suppose to help iggy drive us away because he wants to be left alone; it's suppose to be bad trip music. fun house. raw power. but this music doesn't do that (well, it does for me but not in a good way). this music simply trvializes what he's singing about because it's just so...well, what i said before basically: rah rah drive-the-jetta-around and rock-and-roll, dudes. i mean, c'mon, if these guys are gonna call themselves the stooges then we have to hold them up to stooge standards, regardless of age.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 02:05 (eighteen years ago)

it's suppose to be bad trip music. fun house. raw power.

Interesting that you neglect to mention the first album here in what Stooges music is "supposed to be." The song is about feeling alienation but transcending it anyway. I feel a touch of evil, but I guess it'll be okay. We can have a real cool time tonight.

Re. trivialization in rock music: see R. Meltzer, The Aesthetics of Rock,

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 03:01 (eighteen years ago)

And why shouldn't the alienation he's singing about be trivialized? I think that was the point.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 03:05 (eighteen years ago)

And I can't. There's no slack to be had. They've apparently stolen all the slack and made a bunch of bad songs out of it.

I haven't heard the whole album, but I've heard a few tracks, and really, that was enough. It feels like suffering through an embarassing, deflated balloon. Depressing. All my low expectations and leniency can't save their ship, man. It's half in the water already. And I don't like Iggy's voice all low in the mix, either.

― Bimble, Thursday, 1 March 2007 06:14 (eighteen years ago)

Iggy was trivializing his alienation right away on the first song on the first Stooges record when he said oh my and boo hoo.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 06:42 (eighteen years ago)

"My my and a boo-hoo" I think you'll find was the second half of the greatest couplet in rock.

Hurrah for trivialising Iggy!

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 1 March 2007 08:22 (eighteen years ago)

It's "Oh my."

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 08:27 (eighteen years ago)

That's kind of trivialising things.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 1 March 2007 09:45 (eighteen years ago)

it's touching to read some comments of stooges fans trying to analyze and find meaning to this album,which is basiclly just a bad embarassing album by all means.

― Zeno, Thursday, 1 March 2007 11:14 (eighteen years ago)

many x-post's to tim

Interesting that you neglect to mention the first album here in what Stooges music is "supposed to be."

i will mention the first album right now.

i guess the thing i don't get is that you've barely mentioned the music. beyond the awk description, you've concentrated on the lyrics, which, to me, doesn't make sense when talking about the stooges or any hard rock. i mean, how can anything he says be analyzed without giving consideration to the sounds around it. that's where i am coming from when talking about trivialization. sure, he trivializes his own problems in the opening lines of the first record. BUT, the music behind him -- that dry, lean, scratchy bo diddley beat -- says that this dude has some shit going on and it's kind of ominous. that band is so demonically monotonous, turning boredom into a death march...which you can dance to of course...or just drink booze...or whatever.

back to now, Iggy can say whatever he wants, but the music is totally week, and stooge lyrics about alienation over weak stooge music don't mean much to me.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 12:24 (eighteen years ago)

week=weak!

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 12:25 (eighteen years ago)

Is it just me or does this new song sound like some late-period Tom Petty rave-up?

Like the only thing that these two songs I've heard have in common with the Stooges of yore is the forward-motion dynamism, which is something, I suppose; otherwise sonically, melodically - weak. Not a good start.

― myopic_void, Thursday, 1 March 2007 14:58 (eighteen years ago)

x-post: I definitely don't hear the first Stooges album as a "death march." I hear it as stupid psychedelic minimalism a la the Seeds. So, bubblegum simplcity and repetition is totally germane to the genre and "Free and Freaky" works for me as Stooges music (as, one would assume, it does for them).

I'm not downplaying the original Stooges' ominousness, but I see it as a trivial, post-Bozo Dionysus thing and I'm not that hung up about it and I'd wager that there are more ominous tracks than "Free and Freaky" on the album anyway.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 15:32 (eighteen years ago)

I'd wager that there are more ominous tracks than "Free and Freaky" on the album anyway.

That's a bet you'd lose. From the lyrical subject matter to the generic two-maybe-three-chord punkarama speed-camouflaging-lack-of-ideas riffing, this is an Iggy solo album in all but name. I've listened to the whole thing several times at this point, and there's nothing ominous or powerful about any of its tracks. Steve MacKay is probably the worst served of everyone present - he sounds like a pale shadow of his former self. And Iggy's vocals, throughout, sound first-take and not in a good way - he misses a hell of a lot of notes. And I hate the drum sound - the precision was what made Scott Asheton's work on Funhouse so powerful. That big Albini rumble ruins him.

― unperson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 15:38 (eighteen years ago)

Mark E. Smith misses a hell of a lot of notes on the great new Fall album - just sayin'.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 15:43 (eighteen years ago)

the tom petty rave-up comment hits it pretty close for me.

stupid psychedelic minimalism a la the Seeds

that's a great point.and i def hear that.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 15:55 (eighteen years ago)

So, what is the difference between this stuff and the Stooges canonical material? I agree that this sounds pretty close in a lot of superficial ways - lyrically, musically, maybe even performance-wise. But in less obvious ways, the gap is huge.

So, where's the rub? Why does this suck so goddam bad when all the parts seem to be in their proper place? Well, for one thing, I don't think the original Stooges' ominousness was a trivial component of their sound. They projected an overwhelming level (or a convincing simulation, if you prefer) of youthful alienation and self-loathing. On the first album, the blackness kind of oozes in from around the edges of the songs, the edges of Iggy's jokey self-awareness. On Funhouse and Raw Power, raging nihilism is front and center, without baffles. The music, performances and lyrics are steeped in violence, lust, anguished rejection and the pure joy of breaking shit.

It's easy to romanticize this kind of darkness and therefore to make too much of it. The Stooges aren't justified by their darkness, and it isn't the entirety of their appeal. But it is essential to everything they did. You can't separate the "ominousness" from the music. After all, they aren't great songs, in a Leiber-Stoller sense. The novelty appeal of "I Wanna Be Your Dog" aside, the Stooges offered invocations, vicarious slaughter, ritual acts. Their violent sound and energy and the ensuing implications (bogus or not) made them special. Make them special.

It's a question of tone, of desperation. Of the difference between not knowing what you're doing or even how to do it, only that you have to do it, somehow -- and simply going into a recording studio and banging out some good old-fashioned rock 'n' roll, in accordance with formalist rules and audience expectations. Sure, we never REALLY know what motivates the performances we hear; all we have to go on are the feelings and ideas they engender. So, maybe this version of the band is "feeling it" every bit as much as they did when they were snot-nosed kids. But it doesn't come through in the music. Nothing comes through in the music. Nothing but the idea that a career in rock requires the periodic manufacture of certain musical commodities.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 17:07 (eighteen years ago)

"Essential" didn't really need to be italicized, did it? Didn't think so...

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 17:10 (eighteen years ago)

for one thing, I don't think the original Stooges' ominousness was a trivial component of their sound

You use the term trivial as though it were a bad thing. I will ask this: what was so fucking serious from a sociological standpoint about the Stooges' ominousness anyway? It was trivial all the way. Rock and roll is trivial. So who cares if something gets thrown away? And what the hell in rock and roll has been more played out than stupid evocations of DANGER?

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 17:17 (eighteen years ago)

the Stooges offered invocations, vicarious slaughter, ritual acts.

I'm sorry, but I really find this to be romantic claptrap.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 17:19 (eighteen years ago)

Tim:

Sociological? I dunno how to respond to that. I wasn't framing the Stooges sociologically, but simply trying to defend "DANGER" as an essential component of their appeal/aesthetic/sound. The invocation of danger is a significant (as opposed to trivial) part of what they were up to.

And while rock may be trivial (it is), that doesn't mean it lacks integrity. That any part of it can be dicked with, turned around or thrown away without affecting it's function or meaning. "Stupid evocations of DANGER" may be played out, but they're a big part of the mythology (and thus the function/meaning) of rock.

Yea, I agree that the phrase in question ("vicarious slaughter, ritual acts") is romantic claptrap. Embarassing, even. But I think it's important to embrace art openly, sincerely, on its own terms. Like bogus DANGER, romantic claptrap is essential both to rock and to the Stooges. I have no problem with this, and am perfectly willing to engage in a little claptrap of my own.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 17:40 (eighteen years ago)

As with the exchange with QuantumNoise above, I don't see it as being essential to the Stooges. Iggy was hamming it up by the time of Raw Power. How does the great first Stooges album have more integrity than "Free and Freaky?"

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 18:33 (eighteen years ago)

*not knowing what you're doing or even how to do it*

they knew how to do it.

― scott seward, Thursday, 1 March 2007 18:37 (eighteen years ago)

Responding to both Tim and Scott:

It's impossible to seriously engage with the question of ingegrity in music (at least on ILM). I tried to sketch around that fact in my last couple posts. I don't necessarily see "hamming it up" as being antithetical to meaning it, to feeling it. Iggy and the band were posing throughout their career, but at the same time, they managed to generate the impression of authentic engagement with their own romantic claptrap.

(Oops, I said "authentic." That might cause problems...) I can't nail down the source of that authenticity in purely mechanical terms. I imagine that I perceive it, but that's just me. Maybe I'm projecting. I certainly don't have a better claim to authority than someone who sees the whole thing as intrinsically phony from the ground up.

But I think intentionality and youth enter into it. When I say the Stooges didn't know "how to do it," I mean that they were flying by the seat of their pants. They were young, and hormonally unbalanced, and pig-ignorant, and angry at the world. It seems to me that they didn't have a clear idea what a "Stooges record" was supposed to sound like or of their own importance. They just knew that attacking their instruments (and themselves, and their audience) in a certain way produced alarming results. And they knew that they liked it.

Therefore, the music has a quality of feral engagement, of fumbling exploration, and of genuine idiocy. It's not entirely the feigned comic idiocy that Iggy has come to define as his stylistic trademark, though that's there too. You get the sense of bored, alienated youth viciously, idealistically and naively assaulting the culture around them. Punching the world in the teeth. Assaulting boredom, dead ends, girls that won't put out, grownups and pretty much anything they can get their hand on.

Personally, I get off on that. I like the raw energy, fearlessness and unbalanced malignancy of it. And I don't get any of that from the new stuff.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 19:34 (eighteen years ago)

"Fun and Freaky" is no "I Got a Right"

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:07 (eighteen years ago)

I'm kinda with Tim on this one, all these belabored expectations of what the Stooges SHOULD BE seem sorta pointless to me - just results in a self-fulfilling prophecy of disappointment

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:11 (eighteen years ago)

this is much better than the last barenaked ladies album.

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:13 (eighteen years ago)

" Assaulting boredom, dead ends, girls that won't put out, grownups and pretty much anything they can get their hand on. "

out of all these themes the only one I might expect a 60 yo man to still be interested in is assaulting boredom. presumably by making a record with yr old mates.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:23 (eighteen years ago)

there are some great lyrics on this

maybe i should swallow a little pill
maybe i should listen to dr. phil

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:23 (eighteen years ago)

if we're suppose to divorce this music from the original music, why call themselves the stooges. why play the old music? why make music than can be called rock music?

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:28 (eighteen years ago)

See? I'm sure the Dr. Phil line is a joke, but the reference to self-help once again underscores "the zen macrobiotic side of the Stooges" (as Iggy himself says). So does Iggy swimming laps every day before their recording sessions.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:28 (eighteen years ago)

dont bullshit the bullshitter
dont bullshit the bullshitter
it takes dough to live like a king
it takes dough to live like a king
it takes dough to live like a king
in the midnight hour baby

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:30 (eighteen years ago)

the leaders of rock don't rock
the leaders of rock don't rock
this bothers me quite a lot

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

x-post to QN: I'm arguing that I do hear the Stooges, of course.

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

"if we're suppose to divorce this music from the original music, why call themselves the stooges."

cuz no one bought Skull Ring?

"why play the old music?"

cuz people will pay to hear it? cuz its fun and easy to play?

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

i hang out at the atm
i hang out at the atm
the stooges fight poverty in secret
the stooges fight poverty in secret
the stooges fight poverty in secret

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:33 (eighteen years ago)

x-post to tim, sorry, that was a reply to shakey

cuz its fun and easy to play?

i'm with bangs, this music is harder to make than people think.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:34 (eighteen years ago)

oh come on its folk music

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:37 (eighteen years ago)

(as Watt has noted)

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:37 (eighteen years ago)

and males who exercise everyday have an amazing amount of aggression and hi-NGR!

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:38 (eighteen years ago)

i love gathering around the campfire and strumming some double nickels ;)

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:39 (eighteen years ago)

No, I get you Shakey. They obviously aren't the people they were when, and therefore can't make the same records. A bunch of geezers making music to assault "girls that won't put out" would be horrible. And the frenzied idiocy that fueled the Stooges in their prime (juvenile, hormonal, authentically ignorant) just isn't available to most adults.

But that doesn't mean that old people can't make living, thrilling records. Dead Moon managed it by allowing their rock 'n' roll to show their age: cracked and withered and desperate. Scott Walker and Johnny Cash by wrestling directly with mortality and time. Old people can do LOTS of things, but "be the Stooges" isn't high on the list. The Stooges are/were the romantic embodiment of a particualar kind of misspent youth. Arguably, nothing more than that.

If they want to get together to fight their own boredom by having some fun and rocking out, that's great. Perhaps I'm a fool for wanting the music to be more than a watered-down rehash of past glories. Worse yet a jerk for mentioning my disappointment...

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:39 (eighteen years ago)

baby baby take a look at me
i see your long legs riding your lee's
i see your hair as energy
my dick is turning ino a tree

i got the top down on my cadillac
my stooges t-shirt is riding my back
rock critics wouldn't like this at all
i guess my faith is riding my balls

you can' tell me this is not a suave thing to do!
you can't tell me cuz i know you'd do it too!
i'm trollin'
we're trollin
baby i'm trolling

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:42 (eighteen years ago)

A bunch of geezers making music to assault "girls that won't put out" would be horrible

haha - Neil Young n Crazy Horse version of "Farmer John" springs to mind (surprisingly great and not horrible!)

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:42 (eighteen years ago)

Ed are these real lyrics yr posting? cuz they're crackin me up

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:43 (eighteen years ago)

i mentioned scott walker earlier. i think some of my hostility towards this stooges reunion has to do with digging the latest walker disc. he made me realize that pop/rock artists from that era can still be intensely productive and totally mind blowing. of course, that's a radically diff music than the stooges. but still, it made me rethink many of these older bands and artists from the late 70s and early 60s who are still making music or who have started to make music once again.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:44 (eighteen years ago)

I'm totally not making this shit up

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:45 (eighteen years ago)

Okay, the Trollin' lyric is funny, in a Joe Walsh kinda way. Though I'm unconvinced, I'll give credit where it's due...

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:49 (eighteen years ago)

my how this atmosphere
chills my desire dear
you're so attractive and
i am a man

like the guy in psycho
voices tell me hello
there's death and danger here
for something is queer

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:51 (eighteen years ago)

QN - it seems to me that the options really narrow for performers as they age, as if there's a finite number of personas that are acceptable for older musicians to convey. Particularly when it comes down to the fact that the market for music consumption is dominated by the young. There's only so many things younger folks are willing to hear from old folks - you hit on a few yourself (the aging dignitary schtick of Cash, the visionary-in-an-ivory-tower schtick of Walker, etc.) I think this presents unbelievable obstacles to older artists, who find themselves cut off from approaches and themes that they were previously able to rely on.

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:53 (eighteen years ago)

Pye, would there be examples of older musicians making music that has integrity where the music didn't evoke senses of being cracked and withered and dying?

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:53 (eighteen years ago)

And indeed actually expressed energy and enthusiasm?

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:54 (eighteen years ago)

haha x-post funnies

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:55 (eighteen years ago)

I used to like my neighborhood
it really made me feel good
until they brought in church and steeple
guh-reedy awful people

they drive those fuckin awful cars
and go to ritzy titty bars
guh-reedy awful people

I'm sad and lonely baby
cuz I can't live among my class
I'm thinking only baby
about scoring your piece of ass

they buy pajamas on tv
and visit every place they see
and ruin it instantly
guh-reedy awful people

they always clap on the wrong beat
they're wearing loafers on their feet
guh-reedy awful people

I'm sad and lonely baby
cuz I can't live among my class
I'm thinking only baby
about scoring your piece of ass

this is the last chorus
I don't wanna bore us

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 20:59 (eighteen years ago)

I'm sorry but these lyrics are awesome

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:02 (eighteen years ago)

well I never fell for power titties
or the pussy with disease
I never spent time in a uniform
I never loved a human being

I thought I'd never see defeat
then I saw her walking down the street

she took my money
she took my money
she took my money
she took my money

she took all my money
and she didn't say thank you
she took all my money
and immediately banked it

now she owns a diamond mine
she sets her watch on paris time
i'm living in a friend's backyard
starving like an unsung bard

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:07 (eighteen years ago)

quite a lot of lines about money, interestingly

― Shakey Mo Collier, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:08 (eighteen years ago)

Good question, Tim. The implied question is a good one, too: Do I think that getting older is all about death?

I mean, I'm 40 (or so). My experience of life isn't universal, but it is my experience. And I'd have to say that over the past few years, an awareness of time and loss has come to significantly color my world. Therefore, it would be hard for me to authentically, comprehensively address my experience of life without giving death and decrepitude a fair shake.

But that's just me. And good art doesn't necessarily have to "authentically, comprehensively address [the] experience of life," anyway. Sometimes it just has to be entertaining, or beautiful, or funny or challenging. Still, I think it's awful hard for older people to gracefully imitate the explosive passions of youth. It almost always comes off as embarassingly forced and desperate.

Frankly, I can't think of any examples of older musicians making rich, deep, seemingly "true" music that doesn't consistently reflect age/loss/time/death on some level. Age is intrinisically aged, and honesty about who you are and where you're at is always more graceful than grasping attempts to be something else. I mean, few things are as unattractive as seriously old people dressing "young" and "sexy"...

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:10 (eighteen years ago)

Quick poll: how many here discussing the record have actually heard it?

― Mark Rich@rdson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:12 (eighteen years ago)

i saw a goddess in a pizza joint
she hit my weak spot at a crucial point
when it's a black girl you cannot resist
it's the end of christianity
it's the end of christianity
it's the end of christianity
it's the end of you and me

she wore some short-shorts
man she filled them out
these bodies only come from way down south

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:12 (eighteen years ago)

x-post: We were discussing "Free and Freaky."

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:14 (eighteen years ago)

i got a crazy look in my eye
since my girl ran off with a mexican guy
with a mexican guy
with a mexican guy
with a mexican guy
with a mexican guy

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:17 (eighteen years ago)

this album is almost as good as blah blah blah

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:21 (eighteen years ago)

This from the Wire review:

"Talking of grotesque parodies, Iggy Pop on this record sound like he is sleepwalking through a dream of his younger bad self, muttering abut his dick turning into a tree while hanging out at the ATM, or somesuch, and sounding about as convincing and involved as a sixtysomething Mick Jagger lusting after some brown sugar. And that's all there is to say about that."

― Mark Rich@rdson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:21 (eighteen years ago)

I think the Grinderman record is an interesting contrast to this one. Cave is younger than Iggy by about ten years, but somehow him singing about not getting pussy over a noisy blues riff is far more engaging than what I heard off this.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:24 (eighteen years ago)

I was discussing "Free and Freaky". Also "Trollin'", "The Weirdness" and "Idea of Fun". All of which kinda suck. I haven't heard the whole album, no, and maybe there's wonderful stuff there that hasn't leaked all over the world yet. But given what I have heard, I really doubt it.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:24 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, some of those lyrics are kind of not so awesome (as was the case with "My Idea of Fun")...

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:25 (eighteen years ago)

What he said, X 1000.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:27 (eighteen years ago)

i woke up today i don't wanna do shit
?????????????????????????????????
i don't wanna work i don't wanna smile
i don't even wanna read sunday styles

i'm fried i'm fried i'm fried
i'm fried i'm fried i'm fried
i'm fried i'm fried i'm really fried

hey baby i don't want to pay
can i can come back on giveaway day
is this a bad attitude
crossed with a negative mood

deep fried!
refried!
stir fried!
i'm fried!

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:29 (eighteen years ago)

how many here discussing the record have actually heard it?

Me.

― unperson, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:30 (eighteen years ago)

the album's nothing if not consistent. if you've heard 3 tracks you've got the idea.

― Edward III, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:31 (eighteen years ago)

i have heard the record.

― QuantumNoise, Thursday, 1 March 2007 21:37 (eighteen years ago)

I would say that The Weirdness is the equivalent of Meltzer's foreword to the 1986 reprint of Aesthetics. Of course, I love it.

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 2 March 2007 09:38 (eighteen years ago)

I recommend seeing a physician.

― Bimble, Friday, 2 March 2007 11:58 (eighteen years ago)

Also, Mark Rich@rdson OTM about the Grinderman comparison. I need something that sounds dangerous here, folks, and the new Stooges sounds about as dangerous as a 50's TV commercial about washing powder.

― Bimble, Friday, 2 March 2007 12:04 (eighteen years ago)

GIMME DANGER

― Bimble, Friday, 2 March 2007 12:05 (eighteen years ago)

Get the current Fun-Da-Mental album if you want "dangerous"!

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 2 March 2007 12:20 (eighteen years ago)

I like it too, actually. First play sounded kinda lousy and I figured subsequent listens would bear that out in horrendous detail. Instead I started hearing a good, fuck-it bunch of songs. No way is it up to the first three albums but I enjoy it anyway.

― Matos W.K., Friday, 2 March 2007 13:26 (eighteen years ago)

(I realize my saying so on ILM is roughly the equivalent of Geir telling us he likes a hip-hop record, i.e. nobody is going to give a shit since I'm not exactly Mr. Heavy Rock, but fuggit.)

― Matos W.K., Friday, 2 March 2007 13:27 (eighteen years ago)

Well let's face it, most albums aren't up to the first three Stooges albums, but thanks for the yes vote; I was beginning to feel extremely isolated!

― Marcello Carlin, Friday, 2 March 2007 13:38 (eighteen years ago)

some of his phrasing is awful. you know first takes, when the singer's not sure how they're gonna fit all the syllables in and you end up with really awkward inflections? iggy does this all over the place. on the title track the line reading of "like the guy in psycho, voices tell me hello" is cringe inducing.

sounds like lyrics written in control room, two vocal takes and we're done. which is cool when a band is hot and firing on all cylinders, but the stooges ain't here. I'll admit it has some retardo car crash appeal to it. but I bet if some local bar band coughed this up y'all wouldn't be strokin' yourself over it.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:11 (eighteen years ago)

Um, from the looks of it, "y'all" is about 2 people?

― David R., Friday, 2 March 2007 19:13 (eighteen years ago)

Phrasing is very stiff and mannered I agree. Once you realize how he sings, you can scan any of the above lyrics and figure out the melody without hearing the song. It's very strange.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:18 (eighteen years ago)

TEH WEIRDNESS

― Tim Ellison, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:18 (eighteen years ago)

Um, from the looks of it, "y'all" is about 2 people?

actually

singular = y'all
plural = all y'all

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:19 (eighteen years ago)

Um, "y'all" is short for "you all", which is plural across the board. & "all y'all" is redundantly redundant.

― David R., Friday, 2 March 2007 19:32 (eighteen years ago)

I feel a pedantic grammar beef coming on...

― David R., Friday, 2 March 2007 19:33 (eighteen years ago)

sigh

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:35 (eighteen years ago)

?????????????????????????????????

― David R., Friday, 2 March 2007 19:37 (eighteen years ago)

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/bambie0qb.gif

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:42 (eighteen years ago)

I used to have one of those. Overrated.

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:43 (eighteen years ago)

the couple slow-ish, floaty numbers with more sax are the best.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:57 (eighteen years ago)

actually steve mckay is the MVP of this thing.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Friday, 2 March 2007 19:58 (eighteen years ago)

they should've had liquorball record the album and slap the stooges name on it

― QuantumNoise, Friday, 2 March 2007 20:09 (eighteen years ago)

I bet if some local bar band coughed this up y'all wouldn't be strokin' yourself over it.

who's stroking themselves? I said good not great. if it were a local bar band none of you would hate it to the degree you do.

― Matos W.K., Friday, 2 March 2007 21:31 (eighteen years ago)

if it a were a local bar band people would roll their eyes, maybe be mildly amused. which I think is an appropriate reaction to this album. "hate" is kind of a strong word.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 21:47 (eighteen years ago)

as long as nobody else posts a grief-stricken "where's the artistic integrity?!" we'll be okay.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 21:49 (eighteen years ago)

?????????????????????????????????

― David R., Friday, 2 March 2007 21:53 (eighteen years ago)

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/bambie0qb.gif

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 21:55 (eighteen years ago)

You're right, "hate" is overstating it, just like "strokin' yourselves over it" was. So we're even.

― Matos W.K., Friday, 2 March 2007 22:10 (eighteen years ago)

Put your right hand out, give a firm handshake...

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:13 (eighteen years ago)

HYPERBOLE: THE DOUBLE EDGED SWORD

xpost - what I meant to say before was, fun house is in my top 10 of all-time, but all this "how COULD they?!" shit is for teenagers.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:14 (eighteen years ago)

peace shake, group hug, etc.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:16 (eighteen years ago)

i don't think it's necessarily teenage to have expectations, though.

― QuantumNoise, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:24 (eighteen years ago)

Or *sniff* to shed a bitter tear when you see them dashed to pieces on the ground like so much, so much ... cheap toilet paper!

[Flees room]

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:31 (eighteen years ago)

Don't get me wrong. I wasn't expecting Fun House II like some deluded 15-year-old wetting his pants with excitement. I just think if these guys are going to get back together and attempt to revive the Stooges then we should hold them to some standards, no?

― QuantumNoise, Friday, 2 March 2007 22:36 (eighteen years ago)

Was it better than the recent Dolls album?

― Soukesian, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:12 (eighteen years ago)

I guess. their reunion playing the old material was surprisingly well done, so perhaps there was some expectation that the album would be well done. but "skull ring" didn't exactly set my world on fire, and when I hear the album, it doesn't defy my expectations of what these guys could come up with at this point in time.

think of sabbath recording again with ozzy. results would probably be similarly unspectacular.

and holding bands to "standards" sounds like a surefire way to not hear what they're actually doing.

― Edward III, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:12 (eighteen years ago)

I can't help but remember the Pistols reunion gigs - they were astonishing, but they couldn't possibly have lived up to the nonsense Greil Marcus talked about them.

There's something here about how people like garage rock in theory, but find it embarrassing in practise.

― Soukesian, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:21 (eighteen years ago)

as much as i love stooges, i don't listen to iggy past, like, zombie birdhouse(which i love - and i like everything before it too pretty much), and new stooges don't thrill me at all. the idea of it anyway. i doubt i will hear the album. i listened to the myspace song. i think it's cool that they are getting money though. i'm all for that. iggy said in the paper that nu-stooges are getting more than he ever got at any time in his solo career.

― scott seward, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:49 (eighteen years ago)

Dumb 3 chord garage rock - C/D?

― Soukesian, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:56 (eighteen years ago)

xp - must be a shitload, he was talking about his Bentleys in an interview three or four years back.

I don't mind "Free and Freaky" but the first single sounds like a really crappy version of "No Fun"

― milo z, Friday, 2 March 2007 23:58 (eighteen years ago)

iggy's royalties for "lust for life" from trainspotting and the 10,000 ads it's been in probably made him more money than his entire career up to that point.

around 1993 when I worked at bmi I looked up some of the performance tallies and monster magnet's "twin earth" had logged hundreds of plays, mostly cuz of MTV rotation I imagine. "I wanna be yr dog" by the stooges? 64.

I'll be more jazzed to hear that mckay and asheton are finally able to cash a check.

re: garage rock. is that the right appellation? yeah, they had one foot in the garage, but they were just as much going for the hard rock tag. or the funk one. fun house is a great funk album.

― Edward III, Saturday, 3 March 2007 00:35 (eighteen years ago)

Matos OTM all over the place. Best songs for me are Fried, that croon ballad in the middle, and the floaty tune deepin the record that somebody else alluded to. The band swings so hard on some cuts; 'my idea of fun' sounds much better on Cd and stero speakers than on computer/myspace; Free and Freaky is basically a great MC5 song (which is sweet of the Stooges to do now, when you think about it) (and if you have a problem with the word "freaky" (I know I do), just get past it and dig the tune fer crissakes); and the sequencing is such that the album actually gets better as it goes on. It's perverse -- the weakest songs are at the front. Then again, maybe that's where they belonged, cuz they have no song that can follow Fried, really.
The assumptions about how the lyrics were written; how the phrasing was determined; and how the band rehearsed; are all laughable on the face and anyways factually incorrect.
My suggestion: Leave your baggage at the door, have three beers or whatever it is you need to get you back to being stoopid (read: open-minded), and the album is a pretty good blast with some great, incendiary minutes here and there. Okay, cool.
I hope the Stooges play the entirety of the album during this next tour. They'd be booed, hissed and (if they have the gumption) pelted with quarters by the dork fans pining for the lost days they never had, while the rest of us will just marvel at the pure fuck you bravery of it all. They'll go out hated; in other words, it'll be just like they went out before. Only this time, they'll get some money. Fine by me.

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 01:53 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.suezine.fi/pic/sauna2006/StoogesSauna2006_1.gif
"You paid fifty dollars plus convenience fees, I'm makin fifty thousand baby. One two fuck you bitch!"

― Mike Dixn, Saturday, 3 March 2007 02:05 (eighteen years ago)

The assumptions about how the lyrics were written; how the phrasing was determined; and how the band rehearsed; are all laughable on the face and anyways factually incorrect.

note that I never said it was factually correct, just that it "sounds like." so if Iggy worked hard to create the illusion of a meager effort, kudos to him. I agree it *would* be cool if they played the whole album and nothing else live, with a 20 minute version of "fried" at the end.

but if I have to have 3 beers + get stoopid to really enjoy an album, I'll probably hate myself in the morning.

p.s. condolences re: arthur

― Edward III, Saturday, 3 March 2007 02:16 (eighteen years ago)

Um, "y'all" is short for "you all", which is plural across the board. & "all y'all" is redundantly redundant.

David R. wins. I thought I was losing my mind until this was posted. Thank you. Is "all y'all" some kind of deep South phrase I'm unaware of? Or is it a purely hiphop construction? Etymologists want to know.

Leave your baggage at the door, have three beers or whatever it is you need to get you back to being stoopid (read: open-minded), and the album is a pretty good blast with some great, incendiary minutes here and there. Okay, cool.

Um...no. I've had plenty of fucking drinks tonight and on other nights, too, when I have sampled the goods here and baby, it ain't happening. This is SAD. And pathetic. Okay so they get their money. It won't be from me. To those who like it, hey, good for you. I'll die before I understand it. "Free & Freaky in the USA" give me a break.

― Bimble, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:24 (eighteen years ago)

I think the Grinderman record is an interesting contrast to this one. Cave is younger than Iggy by about ten years, but somehow him singing about not getting pussy over a noisy blues riff is far more engaging than what I heard off this.

Crazy OTM.

I think it happens because Cave was pretending to be an adult eccentric even when he was a kid, so he had room to grow into it. The Stooges was pretending they were 14 when they were 21. What the fuck else can they grow into?

Though if you had Craig Finn singing about not getting any pussy over these same boring-ass songs record and everyone would be doing deer flips right now, so go figure.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:40 (eighteen years ago)

Also, we should have all done the right thing--my initial reaction was to IGNORE this fucking record. I only listened to it because you guys seemed to be talking about it.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:41 (eighteen years ago)

Nick Cave knows nothing about inner stupidity.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:44 (eighteen years ago)

I think it happens because Cave was pretending to be an adult eccentric even when he was a kid, so he had room to grow into it. The Stooges was pretending they were 14 when they were 21.

You're right about Cave pretending, but not about the Stooges.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:49 (eighteen years ago)

I mean what are stupid bands supposed to sound like when they grow up? Ideally what should a Stooges record made by a bunch of 60-year-old men SUPPOSED sound like in 2007?

Coachwhips?
Mudhoney?
Destroy All Monsters?

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Saturday, 3 March 2007 06:50 (eighteen years ago)

Hero-era David Crosby

― QuantumNoise, Saturday, 3 March 2007 19:23 (eighteen years ago)

― Cameron Octigan, Saturday, 3 March 2007 19:41 (eighteen years ago)

I'm sure you'll have your answer when the Guns and Roses album comes out.

― Mike Dixn, Saturday, 3 March 2007 19:54 (eighteen years ago)

That leaked Guns 'n' Roses song is so much better than anything on the Stooges album, though.

― unperson, Saturday, 3 March 2007 20:28 (eighteen years ago)

The Stooges are one of my favorite bands ever, so are Guns N Roses, and I doubt I've given five minutes of thought to both of their new albums, total, since they were first announced. Haven't gone out of my way to hear a single track from either of them, and can't imagine why I'd want to, or why I'd expect either of them to be any good. If copies fall into my lap, I'll listen; who knows, maybe I'll like something, like the two songs I like on the new REO Speedwagon album that fell into my lap yesterday, which is two more than the number of songs I liked on that lame-assed Birthday Party wannabe bore that Nick Cave just put out. (First song on the new REO sounds like Electric Six, honest!) Beyond that, I'm with Cameron Octigon. Iggy's last decent album was Soldier, in 1980 I believe. To think he'd suddenly make a good record 27 years later just because he got together with a bunch of old friends, most of whom haven't played on a good album for even longer, is just wishful thinking, and totally beyond my comprehension., especially given how lame the reunion show I saw at Roseland was. (And Albini is far from a sure thing as a producer, despite good tracks he's done with Living Things, Red Swan, Cordelia's Dad, Gogol Bordello, etc, in the past few years. If anything, those are exceptions to the his-stuff-stinks rule.)

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 20:54 (eighteen years ago)

I thought the Roseland gig (I'm assuming we were at the same one, with acoustic Godsmack and some other horrible band that's since vanished off the face of the earth) was great, and I've liked a few Iggy solo discs from the 80s and 90s—Blah-Blah-Blah, Instinct, American Caesar and Beat 'Em Up all had their moments.

― unperson, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:05 (eighteen years ago)

New York Dolls album last year is another good comparison maybe. Some people loved that, much to my shock, since the version I heard had one good song. Then again, ZZ Top's Mescalero was great. So I'm not saying it never happens. But I don't make a point of hearing new Dylan LPs, either. There's way too much other stuff out there that's more promising.

(As for that Roseland show, it just seemed depressing and pathetic to me, Iggy play-acting some extinct version of himself. Maybe if I was a martian I would have been convinced, I dunno. As is, I left before the set was done.)

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:07 (eighteen years ago)

but chuck, we've actually heard the whole album and you haven't. come back later, okay?

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:09 (eighteen years ago)

right... chuck what exactly is your reference? did you see the stooges perform back in the day???

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:22 (eighteen years ago)

here's what confuses me: (about bands who used to be good reuniting)

1. a lead singer sucks for the last ten years
2. nobody really cares about the other members, for good reason

1 + 2 = the record will suck balls.

is this really that difficult of a concept?

it's a totally logical line of reasoning, except it overlooks the component of personal dynamics. some musicians are pedestrian by themselves but throw 'em together and the sparks fly.

Albini is far from a sure thing as a producer

albini: producer or engineer?

― Edward III, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:29 (eighteen years ago)

"Iggy's last decent album was Soldier, in 1980 I believe."

no, really, it was zombie birdhouse. which was, like, 1981? maybe? that was the last decent one.

― scott seward, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:29 (eighteen years ago)

Why would that be a determining factor in whether I liked the show or not? I (And as I said, I might wind up liking the record. But I can't begin to understand why anybody would expect to, or would seek the thing out.)

If people like it, though, good for them. Same with the show.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:34 (eighteen years ago)

xps obviously. (insert usual complaint about nu-lim here.)

And look, if I went to a Michael Bolton concert, I don't think I'd need to have seen him in his Michael Bolitin/Blackjack days to have an opinion on whether his show entertained me. I'm not sure I get what the difference is.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 21:38 (eighteen years ago)

Devil's Advocate here...

If The Weirdness had been released in 1973 (hypothetically not literally) and the release of Raw Power was imminent, would we be seeing much the same array of comments?

Also: criticism of Iggy's off-key vocals sans irony -- LMAO!!

― chrissie_, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:03 (eighteen years ago)

it's a totally logical line of reasoning, except it overlooks the component of personal dynamics.

It also overlooks the principle that people from time immemorial have, at times during their lives, been able to CLICK INTO SOMETHING in spite of whatever has happened in the past. When I hear "Free and Freaky," I believe I am hearing that.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:27 (eighteen years ago)

chuck sez "Why would that be a determining factor in whether I liked the show or not?"

it wouldn't. it would be a determing factor for me, though, in understanding whether your evaluation of his performance as imitative-of-a-younger-self was based on something real or was just you talking out of your ass. so it's the latter. that's okay.

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:29 (eighteen years ago)

Tim Ellison OTM re the ability to click into It

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:36 (eighteen years ago)

It would be, if I had to have seen him in the same room at the time to compare him to his younger self, or for the comparison to be "real", whatever that means. And obviously, I don't, and neither does anybody else who's been listening to (and watching performances by) his younger self for years. Recording technology, both audio and video, is a wonderful thing.

But this is dumb pissing contest. I get -- you liked the show. Great! So did lots of other people. Guess what? I'm still not excited to hear the album.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:39 (eighteen years ago)

1. What? "Nobody"? Come on. Even I know people who saw the original Stooges in the day who have seen them in the last 3 years or whatever. Surely you do too. Playing dumb isn't cool.
2. Leaving aside #1 for the sake of this one: ohmigawd, a band of 50somethings has an off night, could it be possible??? Arte you completely unaware as to the reviews of their shows by People Who Would Know? Being obtuse isn't cool either.

― jaybabcock, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:43 (eighteen years ago)

Now I'm not even sure what you're arguing with.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 3 March 2007 23:45 (eighteen years ago)

Sorry, xhuxk xddx. I rephrase: There are people around who witnessed the Stooges live in person in their heyday who have seen the Stooges live in person in the last three years. You never witnessed the Stooges in person in their heyday. For me, then, your opinion regarding Iggy's performance then-and-now is thus less informed than theirs. Capiche?

Secondly, I don't for a second believe you're unaware of those people's opinions. Are you honestly saying you know of no one who witnessed the Stooges live in person in both their original formation and now?

― jaybabcock, Sunday, 4 March 2007 00:08 (eighteen years ago)

Uh, no, Jay. I'm not honestly saying that. And I didn't before, either.

And the show still sucked.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 00:20 (eighteen years ago)

Oh ok, sorry to misunderstand.
Sorry you saw a show that sucked. A lot of people who would be in a position-of-knowing have seen Stooges in the last 3 years and said HOLY SHIT. You're aware of that, right?

bottom line for me dude:
informed opinion [greater than symbol] chuck eddy opinion

― jaybabcock, Sunday, 4 March 2007 00:35 (eighteen years ago)

See, thing is, I'm still not sure how an "informed" opinion from other people about those shows being great (as if their greatness is some kind of objective truth to be proven or disproven in the first place) would make it more likely for me to like the new Stooges album. Fact is, I'm not sure whether I do know anybody who saw the Stooges in the early '70s and in the past couple years -- I probably do, but for the reasons I explained earlier, it's not like a completely meaningless (to me anyway) Stooges reunion has been, oh, in the top couple thousand most interesting things in the world of music to have discussions about (or seek out informed opinions, in written review form or otherwise, about) in recent years. (Actually, most of the people who've told me they loved the show I saw were a lot younger, not older than me. Which is fine! Glad they had a good time.) Truth be told, I probably shouldn't have brought up that Roseland show in the first place -- because, right, maybe it was just an off night. But even more important, even if I had loved that show, I seriously can't imagine I'd have high expectations for a reunion album. The preponderance of evidence leading into it suggests the record will stink. People can romanticize the "chemistry" of more-or-less-original lineups all they want (hey, rock fans do it all the time -- just ask the Police and Van Halen), but it's still really rare that good music winds up coming out of it. The fact that the Stooges' main songwriter, once upon a time probably the greatest songwriter on the planet, has barely written a memorable song in the past quarter century would seem to be a mark against them, chemistry or no chemistry. But what I do know? I'll hear the album when I hear it. If you don't get why I don't have high hopes, you're asleep.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:07 (eighteen years ago)

what do you know???? you don't know shit, which is what i was saying in the first place. pure ass-talk/idiot wind.

― jaybabcock, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:14 (eighteen years ago)

Guns N Roses and the Stooges are also two of my...ten or so favorite bands, and I could give a fuck less about hearing either of their new albums so I understand that sentiment. Maybe if this were 1994 or 1975, respectively, but now...it doesn't even seem like the "real" bands. And to some extent, I guess Guns N Roses really ISN'T the real band at all.

― Reatards Unite, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:16 (eighteen years ago)

Also, from the two new Stooges tracks I've heard while in the car with other people, the biggest problem is the vocals. It reminds me of when a band goes into a studio to record their first demo and the singer nervously mumbles through the lyrics without any presence whatsoever. It's not being off-key that's the main problem, although that is an issue, but it's just that there's no force behind his vocals anymore, which is surprising considering that it's the same vocalist that sings "1970", etc.

― Reatards Unite, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:24 (eighteen years ago)

Uh oh, we've got multiple question marks.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:25 (eighteen years ago)

um, dude, jay. why are you being an asshole? though i generally disagree with xhuxk, he's offered persuasive, reasonable arguments as to why this album may be no greater than any other whose writers haven't done anything good in thirty years. he might be wrong, but chill.

― mookieproof, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:26 (eighteen years ago)

Seriously Jay, don't get too heated. This is subjective. You guys diagree and perhaps even find each other's reasons invalid. Why not leave it at that?

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:28 (eighteen years ago)

Really. I mean, Chuck is no Sully Erna.

― unperson, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:36 (eighteen years ago)

the singer nervously mumbles through the lyrics without any presence whatsoever... there's no force behind his vocals anymore

Any chance that might be Albini's doing? I'm just saying...

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 01:47 (eighteen years ago)

xpost

I wasn't gonna say it.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:02 (eighteen years ago)

Again, though, for me - I've just been listening to the great new Fall album (no, really) with, you know, MARK E. SMITH on lead vocals, so it can't help but make me question the criticisms of lack of presence, no force, mumbling, missing notes, "sounding first take," etc.!

I like the flat notes on "Free and Freaky" - Real People's music and all that.

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:07 (eighteen years ago)

nobody was criticizing mark e. smith.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:11 (eighteen years ago)

or wait, maybe someone was, and i missed it.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:11 (eighteen years ago)

i didn't say anyone was criticizing mark e. smith...

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:24 (eighteen years ago)

What I am saying is that mumbling and lack of presence and missing notes are givens for MES - doesn't mean he didn't rock the mic. Same principle can apply for others.

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:28 (eighteen years ago)

Huh? Mark E Smith had more force and presence than, like 99 percent of indie rock singers; he was always in the forefront, often used his voice as rhythm (like Iggy and Axl could too), never got lost in the shuffle. (At least not when I was paying attention. I haven't spent much time with a new Fall LP since the late '80s.) So I'm kind of stumped by what Tim's getting at, too.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:43 (eighteen years ago)

he even has a commanding mumble.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:48 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, he started being more mumbly a long time ago.

He definitely belts some stuff out on the new LP, though!

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:48 (eighteen years ago)

(Heh heh, I'll toss Craig Finn into that list too, just to bug Whiney. Finn's closer to Mark E. than to Iggy or Nick Cave, anyway. And he's great.)

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:48 (eighteen years ago)

I'm in total curious-observer-non-attack mode here, just a question, Chuck: do you just have a sense when a band is no longer going to interest you for the remainder of their career? You mention your avoidance of new Dylan, new Fall, etc., just curious.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:52 (eighteen years ago)

Good question, but I'm not sure what you're asking, really. I eventually just stop getting excited about hearing new albums by whatever act it is, I guess. Doesn't mean I'll run away later on if a Dylan or Fall or Stooges of GnR album is handed to me on a silver platter on in my mailbox, but after I've heard a few meh ones in a row by said act, I'm not going to seek one out, even if, like those four acts, they've made some of my favorite albums ever. Guess it's just a question of diminishing returns....If anything, I'm stumped that this doesn't happen with everybody. It just seems natural. New bands come along that are more interesting than the old bands! Right now, I'm more way excited about the new Miranda Lambert LP than any of this stuff.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 02:58 (eighteen years ago)

I mean, there a couple hundred good albums made every year; why settle for mediocre ones by bands who useta make great ones? Sorry. I don't get that.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 03:00 (eighteen years ago)

"Excited" isn't really the way I'd describe my reaction to the album; "surprised that it was pretty good" is. (That's to clarify; I don't think Chuck is assuming anything else about my or someone else's response to it.)

― Matos W.K., Sunday, 4 March 2007 03:07 (eighteen years ago)

Not at all! And as I've said repeatedly, I might be surprised too. (If I hear it, that is.)

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 03:09 (eighteen years ago)

Last year, I was surprised by Joan Jett, George Thorogood, and Def Leppard!

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 03:15 (eighteen years ago)

don't do us any favors.

to me what's so interesting about a stooges reunion, as opposed to the police or van halen, is that these guys were so underated ignored and/or hated in their heyday and 99% of their fans discovered them posthumously. there's something unfinished there worth reivisting I'd say, a lot of potential something untapped. also these guys have been playing together a few years now, there's chemistry involved unlike a tense forced payday reunion like the apparently aborted van halen or doomed police tours which are just paydays. one of my best friends saw the stooges back in the day, FWIW, at the infamous Midsummer Night's Rock festival in 1970 that was televised. it was the first time he got drunk on whiskey, he was 15 and really doesn't remember anything. that's appropriate for the stooges. I saw ron & scott asheton play a bunch of times in the later 70s w/their post stooges bands, they were definitely jamming. it warms the cockles of my heart that these guys are getting their due and doing their thing now and people actually care.

― m coleman, Sunday, 4 March 2007 03:29 (eighteen years ago)

without this thread i don't think i would have thought about reunited stooges at all. and really, there are few bands that mean as much to me. not like i'm a completist fanatic, but those albums are a part of me in a very real and important way. that song on the myspace page actually sounds like what i would have expected such a thing to sound like. and it doesn't make me want to investigate further. i think it's nice that people have nice things to say. there isn't really any way to not come across as a major killjoy to fans who just love the fact that these people are playing again together.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 04:01 (eighteen years ago)

"Free and Freaky" rules, though. Link again for lamers who missed it first time (joke!):

http://www.stereogum.com/archives/004712.html

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 04:09 (eighteen years ago)

um, okay, i listened to that. thanks? i still think it's nice that people are being nice. hey, i went and saw the pretty things when they came around philly! and the chameleons! chameleons were great that night! so, i understand.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 04:18 (eighteen years ago)

You're welcome. I actually thought you would like that!

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 04:39 (eighteen years ago)

yeah, not so much. maybe my stooges standards are too high? like i said, my iggy standards for the last 25 years or so have not been high at all. i haven't expected anything seriously cool from him in a million years. and this kinda sounds like the iggy that i pay no heed. i still think he's funny and stuff. he's a cool dude. and geeky as hell. which is truly endearing. i kinda wince when i see the words "dumb" and "stupid" thrown around this thread and elsewhere. they were so fucking smart. it hurts my heart. but i get it. and i have used the word dumb before in describing stooges in print. but i used it carefully and pointedly.

― scott seward, Sunday, 4 March 2007 05:21 (eighteen years ago)

I like Rock Action's playing on it.

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 05:27 (eighteen years ago)

I was just about to put down a hundred bucks for a pair of tix to their April show in NYC. But then I remembered how shitty the MC5 reunion show I saw in Detroit was a couple years ago... Now granted they're missing two key members, but this was the MOTOR CITY, and it was just lifeless. I saw Iggy solo at Coney Island High back in '95 and he blew me away. Surely the Stooges shows won't be bad, will they?

― MC, Sunday, 4 March 2007 06:08 (eighteen years ago)

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― Bimble, Sunday, 4 March 2007 07:09 (eighteen years ago)

Though if you had Craig Finn singing about not getting any pussy over these same boring-ass songs record and everyone would be doing deer flips right now, so go figure.

Bahahahaha. You know it!

1. a lead singer sucks for the last ten years
2. nobody really cares about the other members, for good reason

1 + 2 = the record will suck balls.

Woah, I think you're on to something here.

Jaybabcock was only trying to make the point that the Stooges absolutely kicked arse live a mere 2 years ago, I can't take sides, though because I also agree with Chuck's main point: the new album is still not worth bothering with.

Though I never needed to know that REO Speedwagon released a reunion album. That was more information than I ever wanted to learn, xhuxk. Thanks but no thanks. Although I will allow it's not as traumatic as someone telling me Air Supply have reformed. (don't even try it - I mean it! Or I won't be your friend)

Also, from the two new Stooges tracks I've heard while in the car with other people, the biggest problem is the vocals. It reminds me of when a band goes into a studio to record their first demo and the singer nervously mumbles through the lyrics without any presence whatsoever. It's not being off-key that's the main problem, although that is an issue, but it's just that there's no force behind his vocals anymore, which is surprising considering that it's the same vocalist that sings "1970", etc.

P0wned.

― Bimble, Sunday, 4 March 2007 07:36 (eighteen years ago)

now I'm not drunk: another thing abt the Stooges/MC5 is they were never "professional" rock bands in terms of consistency, more like the Dead and/or Sonic Youth where they could be absolutely transcendent or resoundingly awful depending on the weather -- people at the same show could disagree abt which.

― m coleman, Sunday, 4 March 2007 12:40 (eighteen years ago)

there's chemistry involved unlike a tense forced payday reunion like the apparently aborted van halen or doomed police tours which are just paydays

first thing, i don't know anybody's motivations for reuniting. but i would say the stooges are looking for a payday just as much if not more than vh and the police. hell, the police tour seens like it might be the least financially driven of all three. but that's just a guess on my part. i don't even like the police.

― QuantumNoise, Sunday, 4 March 2007 13:30 (eighteen years ago)

yo everbody wan get paid, nothing wrong with that! Obv I don't know what goes on in somebody else's head and wouldn't presume to speculate on motivations, but after reading the recent NY Times feature on the Police reunion I got the idea these guys really didn't enjoy each other's company much and the musical chemistry on display was minimal. so maybe mercenary fits better than payday, that's no sin either.

― m coleman, Sunday, 4 March 2007 15:00 (eighteen years ago)

Air Supply never broke up!

― J, Sunday, 4 March 2007 15:58 (eighteen years ago)

yes, i totally agree: nothing wrong with getting paid. I was just questioning that point, which, to me, sounds like a very basic underground/mainstream stereotype: The underground dudes (Stooges) are in it for the music, while the mainstream bands (VH and Polices) are in it for the money. Those who have the greatest to gain from the money are actually all the Stoooges who are not Iggy. And as for the Police and VH, I think fame and celebrity are more of an allure than straight up cash. Of course, maybe one of those VH dudes has some financial problems, But the Police all seem really well off and stable.

― QuantumNoise, Sunday, 4 March 2007 16:01 (eighteen years ago)

The other assumption, of course, is that the purity of their motivations have some direct correlation with resulting music quality. (Which is not to suggest that I wouldn't have even lower expectations for a Van Halen or Police reunion than for a Stooges one; I probably would. New album by Chelsea -- "last time Chris Bashford and I recorded a Chelsea studio album together was in 1979," James Stevenson says in the notes -- sounds good, though!)

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 16:29 (eighteen years ago)

Air Supply never broke up!

They are reportedly loved in Jamaica (where they've played twice in the past couple years).

― xhuxk, Sunday, 4 March 2007 16:36 (eighteen years ago)

Oh thank goodness, I have nothing to fear then. As long as they stay off my radar, I'm okay with whatever they want to do.

― Bimble, Sunday, 4 March 2007 16:47 (eighteen years ago)

[Removed Illegal Link]
Usual caveats about particular inflections not coming across in print applied and noted, thanks.

― Mike Dixn, Sunday, 4 March 2007 18:06 (eighteen years ago)

Okay, whatever that means. This quote is from today's Chicago Tribune article about the Stooges:
"It was like seeing your ex-wife for the first time in 20 years," Ron Asheton says. "But then we started talking and all the nervousness faded. He said something like, `My management said that you guys could help me save my career.'"

― Mike Dixn, Sunday, 4 March 2007 18:12 (eighteen years ago)

Why should Chuck even bother listening to this album honestly? Pretty much every assumption I had about it was right (except for the assumption that it wouldn't have a song on it about your girl running off with a "Mexican Guy").

Seriously, name one band that disappeared for 30 years and returned with an album that's a must hear. I was seriously about to ignore it, but then saw how heated this thread was. You guys owe me an hour of my life back.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Sunday, 4 March 2007 20:58 (eighteen years ago)

People can romanticize the "chemistry" of more-or-less-original lineups all they want (hey, rock fans do it all the time -- just ask the Police and Van Halen), but it's still really rare that good music winds up coming out of it.

chemistry between musicians exists, really it does. sure you can romanticize it, you can romanticize anything connected to rock stars. but it's like any human relationship, between some people there's a spark. I see it in non-famous bands, or bands I don't even like, so I don't think its fan-based romanticization.

even the mighty fall's fortunes rise and recede based on smith's chemistry with who he's playing with, and he's found some real goers recently. that peel session (their last?) w/ "sparta f.c." was hot.

a question for reunions is whether the parties involved can create the conditions for a spark to stay alive. they might have enough for a handful of good times before baggage starts getting in the way. and I guess there's a distinction to be made between playing the oldies and producing new material. the latter is a lot tougher than the former, and that's maybe what you were saying anyway?

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:03 (eighteen years ago)

I didn't think that the album was any good at all. Terrible lyrics, forgettable songs, and a really weak vocal outing by Iggy.

Didn't have any of the menace.

Album art was kind of neat, though.

― novaheat, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:10 (eighteen years ago)

I didn't think that the album was any good at all. Terrible lyrics, forgettable songs, and a really weak vocal outing by Iggy.

Didn't have any of the menace.

Album art was kind of neat, though.

― novaheat, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:10 (eighteen years ago)

Oops.

― novaheat, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:10 (eighteen years ago)

xpost to whiney
http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/B000B5S826.01._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:10 (eighteen years ago)

not a band but the first one that came to mind

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:12 (eighteen years ago)

leave it to ilm to turn this thread into a referendum on reunions

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:14 (eighteen years ago)

Now find me the person who heard Naughty Little Doggie, Skull Ring, Brick By Brick or American Caeser that thinks Iggy still has a record in him as good as a Vashi Bunyan record.

Seriously, sometimes it should be perfectly OK to talk out of your ass.

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:16 (eighteen years ago)

I like what you posted about chemistry. Other this thread pisses me off, I don't really know why.

― m coleman, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:18 (eighteen years ago)

Remember that sketch on Saturday Night Live where Tom Hanks had the spoiled milk and then made everyone try it? And the chair with the nail on it and then made everyone sit on it. "OH THIS IS SO SPOILED... HERE!"

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:18 (eighteen years ago)

after hearing the new rtx track, which tim posted a link to on the rtx thread, i'm now convinced that jennifer herrema should've produced this disc.

― QuantumNoise, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:23 (eighteen years ago)

Seriously, sometimes it should be perfectly OK to talk out of your ass.

haha wrong message board for that!

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:44 (eighteen years ago)

haha wrong message board for that!

Edward III on Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:44

arguable.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:51 (eighteen years ago)

ilm's a lot more interesting when chuck leaves the lair of the rolling thread. he's like the zen master of making people challenge their own assumptions. probably gives him an ulcer, though.

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:51 (eighteen years ago)

arguable.

are you kidding? there's no assertion without a rejoinder around here. or at least an attempt to image spam you into submission.

― Edward III, Sunday, 4 March 2007 21:59 (eighteen years ago)

there's no assertion without a rejoinder around here. or at least an attempt to image spam you into submission.

These are two very very different things, and I'd hold that the latter (which outnumbers the former) is just another form of ass-talking.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 22:05 (eighteen years ago)

Please to see "Has ILM Gotten Smarter" etc

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Sunday, 4 March 2007 22:19 (eighteen years ago)

As far as wondering why someone would even imagine that something might really go down with a new Stooges album, there are a couple of things for me. One is what Jay Babcock was talking about with all the platitudes about their live shows. Still, I didn't necessarily expect for Iggy Pop to turn on a dime career-wise until I heard "Free and Freaky."

That said, I'm getting impressions of both greatness and horribleness from the two tracks being previewed and from all of the lyrics Edward posted, so I still don't really know what to expect.

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 4 March 2007 22:30 (eighteen years ago)

there's no assertion without a rejoinder around here. or at least an attempt to image spam you into submission.

These are two very very different things, and I'd hold that the latter (which outnumbers the former) is just another form of ass-talking.

you're right, ilm is at least 60% images. plz to note sarcasm (in original post and this one).

and if you know of this magical internet nirvana where ass-talking about music is less predominant, why you hangin' 'round here?

― Edward III, Monday, 5 March 2007 00:01 (eighteen years ago)

Cause I ass-talk as much as the rest of you fucks.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Monday, 5 March 2007 01:02 (eighteen years ago)

Except the teenpop doods, from whose might I cower in fear.

/earnestness

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Monday, 5 March 2007 01:03 (eighteen years ago)

ilm house band: ass-talk and the fucks

― Edward III, Monday, 5 March 2007 01:05 (eighteen years ago)

Srsly dude I was just making the point that you're about as likely to be rebutted in a given thread as you are to be mocked & imagebombed. Is that really that contentious of a point?

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Monday, 5 March 2007 01:08 (eighteen years ago)

re-BUTTED! Here's to ass talk!

― Bimble, Monday, 5 March 2007 08:40 (eighteen years ago)

All of that said, I could do without half the songs on the album! Ay yi yi...

― jaybabcock, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 00:57 (eighteen years ago)

I liked American Caesar and have never heard Vashti Bunyan, and that album cover makes me think I really wouldn't like him/her/it if I ever did.

― unperson, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 01:02 (eighteen years ago)

I'd do Vashti Bunyan.

― Drooone, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 01:14 (eighteen years ago)

i love this record

― james blount, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 07:43 (eighteen years ago)

I liked 'Candy', will I love 'The Weirdness'?

― baaderonixx, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 09:14 (eighteen years ago)

Well, the review from All Music is in, and it ain't pretty kids. Now, for all time and history:

The Stooges - Weirdness
The creative and interpersonal dynamics of a rock band are notoriously tricky, and when a band hasn't worked together for a few decades, simply getting the same people together in a recording studio doesn't guarantee lightning is going to strike again. In 2003, more than 30 years after the original lineup of the Stooges collapsed after the commercial failure of Fun House, Iggy Pop finally buried the hatchet with his former bandmates Ron Asheton and Scott Asheton, and they hit the road for a series of heroic reunion shows (with Mike Watt standing in on bass for the late Dave Alexander) in which they miraculously re-created the dinosaur-stomp sound and feel of their first two albums. After the riotous reception of the Stooges' reunion shows, Iggy and the Ashetons took the next logical step and recorded a new Stooges album, but while the reconstituted band sounded stunning on-stage (check out the Telluric Chaos CD or the Live in Detroit 2003 DVD for evidence), in the studio the Stooges reunion went horribly awry with 2007's The Weirdness. It would have been foolish to expect The Weirdness to sound just like The Stooges or Fun House, given how much water has flowed under the bridge, but what's startling is how little this album recalls the primal groove of their previous work (or the sound they recently delivered on-stage). While Ron Asheton's guitar howls as loud as ever, the pulsating wah-wah and ripsaw fuzz that were his aural trademarks are all but missing, and while his solos step back into the noisy id, they lack the coherence and internal logic of his brilliant work on Fun House. Similarly, Scott Asheton's drumming is muscular and his timing is superb, but while he created an unexpectedly sensuous groove out of stuff like "Down in the Street," "1969," and "Real Cool Time," here he stomps away with lots of gravity but little nuance, and like his brother, he's traded soul for jackhammer force (emphasized by Steve Albini's hard-edged recording). But surprisingly, the guy who really drops the ball on this set is Iggy. Pop's been in fine voice on his last few solo albums, but much of The Weirdness finds him singing a bit flat or sharp, and while he belts out these songs with commendable passion, this ranks with Beat Em Up as the dumbest set of lyrics the man has ever committed to tape. Instead of reaching into the Real O Mind for the cosmic simplicity of stuff like "TV Eye," "1970," or "I Wanna Be Your Dog," Iggy goes into inane blather mode from the jump-start, and if titles like "Greedy Awful People," "Free and Freaky," and "I'm Fried" don't tip off listeners that he's off his game, lines like "England and France, these cultures are old/The cheese is stinky and the beer isn't cold," "They drive those f*ckin' awful cars/And roll their lips in titty bars," and the deathless "My dick is turning into a tree" tell the rest of the story. While Ron and Scott may not be at their best here, when they connect (and sometimes they do) you can imagine The Weirdness might have been an OK rock album, especially with Mike Watt's solid, workmanlike basslines and Steve Mackay's free-skronk saxophone. Iggy's songs, however, sink this particular ship, and if this doesn't conclude the Stooges saga on as crushing a note as Metallic K.O. did when it brought down the curtain on their first era, there's no denying The Weirdness is a major disappointment that puts a real chink in this great band's legacy. ~ Mark Deming

― MC, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 10:15 (eighteen years ago)

So, last year's Radio Birdman reunion disc was pretty good...

― MC, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 10:16 (eighteen years ago)

These are exactly the same sort of reviewers who when Raw Power was new and fresh would have been nitpicking and slagging it off for not being Funhouse.

Of course Iggy is going to sing things like "My dick is turning into a tree." What do you wrinkly pensioners want him to sing? Fucking Roger Waters?

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 10:28 (eighteen years ago)

Actually, enlarge on that; these are the sort of cardigans who would never have liked the Stooges in the first place and couldn't wait to get back to their hot James Taylor platters.

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 10:29 (eighteen years ago)

England and France, these cultures are old/The cheese is stinky and the beer isn't cold

― baaderonixx, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 11:01 (eighteen years ago)

Actually, enlarge on that

"My dick is turning into a large elm tree."

― Mark G, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 11:05 (eighteen years ago)

"petrified wood" = slang for Viagra overdose

― m coleman, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 11:25 (eighteen years ago)

Of course Iggy is going to sing things like "My dick is turning into a tree." What do you wrinkly pensioners want him to sing? Fucking Roger Waters?

there's a line between smart-being-stoopid, and stupid-being-stoopid. iggy's lyrics are more in the latter category this go-around. they lack his flair for memorable imagery, a talent he's evidenced over the course of his career, even when his backing music has been sub-par.

ps I think "my dick is turning into a tree" is one of the better, funnier lines on the album.

― Edward III, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:18 (eighteen years ago)

i've listened to this thing three times today. outside of some pretty good guitar work, i can see it being a hit with the Warped, pop-punk crowd.

― QuantumNoise, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:41 (eighteen years ago)

that's a damning indictment.

― Edward III, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:44 (eighteen years ago)

I would not be surprised to see it outsell each of their other albums by the end of the year.

― Mike Dixn, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:52 (eighteen years ago)

that's a damning indictment.

yeah, i know. i'm not trying to be intentionally nasty with that statement. but some of this stuff is fairly tight pop-punk kinda stuff with those thick sheets of guitars and snappy changes.

― QuantumNoise, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:55 (eighteen years ago)

If this outsells all their other albums someone in the Virgin marketing department deserves a very large bonus.

― Mark Rich@rdson, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 19:55 (eighteen years ago)

"The Seeds are my group. The Seeds are great. What me and my friends used to do, when we were unemployed, on the docks, blah blah blah, was order records by the Seeds from America. You would go into a Virgin Records shop in 1972 and they would say: 'You can't have this, what you need is Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield. Go on, it's only £1.50.' It's mind control. They used to boast about how they could get any LP, and they couldn't.

"To wind 'em up we would go there and say, 'Can you get us that record of the MC5 live in bloody Los Angeles?' They'd say, 'Don't you want the Grateful Dead?' 'Nope.' 'How about Pink Floyd Live?' 'Nope. I want MC5 and the Stooges and the Seeds.'"

-Mark E. Smith, The Guardian, Friday May 18, 2001

― sexyDancer, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 20:03 (eighteen years ago)

Marcello's comment rings true for me. I don't really see the difference between someone saying "Free and Freaky" is too stupid in 2007 and someone saying "Real Cool Time" was too stupid in 1969. The AMG reviewer's argument about how the earlier stuff partakes more of teh "Real O Mind" is not at all clear to me.

― Tim Ellison, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 20:26 (eighteen years ago)

http://flse.adv100.com/fse/data/html/fse/102005/149291/nigel.jpg
There's a very fine line...

― sexyDancer, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 20:32 (eighteen years ago)

http://tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:soeHaQl9tMWLVM:http://blaklion.best.vwh.net/images/UniMind.jpg

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 6 March 2007 20:34 (eighteen years ago)

Was my devil's advocacy superfluous, then? ;-)

Having now listened to it (resisted advance copies to indulge the rather silly routine of going to the store and buying it On The Day -- sad or wot)...

I like it. And maybe even mostly because I think these songs will rock live. I don't care from Iggy's dodgy vocals or ultra-dumb lyrics -- all is cool. If there is a problem, or if you want to see it like that, I think it's the way it is essentially a live studio performance, little to no multitracking or dubs, etc, and a very unpolished sound (almost muffled in places) -- it hasn't got the ambience or acoustics of a stage performance, but it does has some of the negative values thereof (i.e. the one-take vocals), and I guess, in 2007, we're not all that tolerant of such things, and you have to ask -- Iggy! Why?! (No, I don't think it sounds like an Iggy solo. Skull Ring was slick as hell. Weirdness has virtually NO production.)

This is how he wanted it, no doubt. Anyone read the Mojo piece? His comments on Albini are revealing, but in essence, he's saying the remit was, 'Don't you dare bring any ideas to the table!'

Then again, if this is Iggy giving the finger to any conceivable expectations, I could enjoy it on that level too. I don't know if that's the case, but it wouldn't surprise me.

It couldn't ever compete with the Stooges Legend/Myth, so taking it away from that, it's a fun record that could use some extra attention to the recording side of things.

― chrissie_, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 14:34 (eighteen years ago)

Seriously, name one band that disappeared for 30 years and returned with an album that's a must hear.

um this is "cheating" sorta, cuz onOFFon wasn't a total classic, but now after The Obiterati, i think Mission of Burma has a pretty good case for one of the best comebacks ever.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 17:06 (eighteen years ago)

The Wedding Present.

(I'm Off!)

― Mark G, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 17:10 (eighteen years ago)

Current score of 40 on metacritic.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 17:14 (eighteen years ago)

Mission Of Burma probably the best comeback ever, yeah.

But who really thought for one second that this album would be Burma caliber?

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 17:15 (eighteen years ago)

new realization: asheston's guitar on this record fuckin rules. every retro-garage hack on the planet should be taking notes on the real thing. seriously.

― QuantumNoise, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 20:10 (eighteen years ago)

um this is "cheating" sorta, cuz onOFFon wasn't a total classic, but now after The Obiterati, i think Mission of Burma has a pretty good case for one of the best comebacks ever.

M@tt He1ges0n on Wednesday, March 7, 2007 11:06 AM

otm

― M.V., Wednesday, 7 March 2007 20:29 (eighteen years ago)

See, what's gonna happen is this:

In five years, The Weirdness will be hailed as a seminal, groundbreaking classic.

In 20 years, someone will pull an 80-year-old Iggy out of the Home for Ancient and Demented Rockers and plonk him behind a mixing desk. He'll proceed to turn everything up to ten to fix that fey bugger Steve Albini's 'limp-wristed' mix.

Critical response will be split.

See if I'm wrong. I'm fucking psychic, me.

― chrissie_, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:32 (eighteen years ago)

In five years, The Weirdness will be hailed as a seminal, groundbreaking classic.

By decree of our alien overlords?

― M.V., Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:47 (eighteen years ago)

that iggy mix of raw power suxxxxxx

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:53 (eighteen years ago)

IT. DOES. NAWT!

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:53 (eighteen years ago)

but then the iggy mix is my only experience with raw power, so wtf do i know.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:55 (eighteen years ago)

12-foot alien overlord IGUANAS, mind you.

Not decree: mind control.

I bet you think My Idea of Fun is ironic, eh?

It was a controlled demolition, dammit!

Whoah. I need to lie down...

― chrissie_, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:56 (eighteen years ago)

I do have a high-quality MP3 rip of Bowie mix of RP, actually, on some disc somewhere. It sounds quite weedy to me, just from a sound quality perspective. There are a couple of those original mix tracks on the Nude and Rude compilation, which is still on sale in a lot of stores.

― chrissie_, Wednesday, 7 March 2007 23:59 (eighteen years ago)

did they ever remaster the bowie mix, the cd master sucks on those originals....that was needed not ig's super macho demolition job.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Thursday, 8 March 2007 00:00 (eighteen years ago)

A cool idea. Remastering is good, completely reworking sommat and putting the original out of print is BAD. Hmmm... still time for a 35th Anniversary reissue with both mixes of the album, the original in a more sparkling, remastered format. Someone start a petition. Sit outside Iggy's mansion with placards. Harass him on the golf course. Whatever.

― chrissie_, Thursday, 8 March 2007 00:07 (eighteen years ago)

RP Iggy mix>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>RP Bowie mix

― M.V., Thursday, 8 March 2007 01:51 (eighteen years ago)

I hear the Bowie mix as a White Light, White Heat kind of thing. I think it's great!

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 8 March 2007 02:55 (eighteen years ago)

you people can't bait me into going on and on forever again about what an abomination iggy's mix is. I WON'T LET YOU.

― scott seward, Thursday, 8 March 2007 04:34 (eighteen years ago)

isn't the general consensus that anybody who liked the original mix of raw power doesn't like the remix, and anybody who didn't like the original mix likes the remix?

― Edward III, Thursday, 8 March 2007 05:57 (eighteen years ago)

and that anyone on speed likes the original and doesn't want to hear a reissue?

(I am not on speed but I don't want to hear it).

Except: the cd master sucks on those originals

SO TRUE DAT...

― Saxby D. Elder, Thursday, 8 March 2007 06:01 (eighteen years ago)

They shouldn't have written any new songs, they have enough classics that weren't recorded properly, like Open up and Bleed, Cock in my Pocket, I Got Nothing - but those were all with/by James Williamson, weren't they? :-/

― StanM, Thursday, 8 March 2007 07:45 (eighteen years ago)

Pity they didn't record it with Rick Rubin

― mentalist, Thursday, 8 March 2007 10:05 (eighteen years ago)

I'm with Scott. The Iggy mix of Raw Power blows.

― unperson, Thursday, 8 March 2007 11:50 (eighteen years ago)

"They shouldn't have written any new songs, they have enough classics that weren't recorded properly, like Open up and Bleed, Cock in my Pocket, I Got Nothing"

yeah! i might have actually bought it. i love a lot of those songs. and they had more than enough for an album.

― scott seward, Thursday, 8 March 2007 13:45 (eighteen years ago)

Love the Iggy mix of Raw Power!

That said, I spent years hating it. Especially in light of Funhouse, it sounds all thin and rickety. But after bitching and moaning about it for years, I finally gave up wanting it to be something else and just accepted it. Taken on it's own terms, it's fucking great. As different from Funhouse as Funhouse is from The Stooges. The weird, treble-kicked fragility is cool as hell, totally unique. While the songs don't ROOOAAAR like you might expect, they have this furious, spastic tension that's just as powerful.

I looked forward to hearing the Iggy mix for years, but it didn't blow me away. It doesn't exactly suck, of course, but it isn't very interesting either.

P.S. After spending a couple days with The Weirdness, my opinion of nu-Stooge hasn't changed for the better. "The dead do not improve."

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:03 (eighteen years ago)

you guys are killing me. do all stooges threads end in tears?

― scott seward, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:07 (eighteen years ago)

all ~~stooges~~ threads end in tears?

fixed.

― Mark G, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:13 (eighteen years ago)

X post: what the fuck am I talking about??? It's too early in the morning out here. The first line was supposed to be about the Bowie mix. How I like the Bowie mix. All twitchy druggy and stuff. But I fucked it up. Now it's just gibberish from not enough coffee. But, hey: I saw Iggy the other day in The Prestige. Holy shit is he old. Playing Nicolai Tesla of all people. Still with the one weird eye. Fuckin' Bowie.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:14 (eighteen years ago)

"Love the ~~Iggy~~ BOWIE mix of Raw Power!"

See, it was supposed to be like that, 'cuz, um, the record, and ... ummm ...

shit

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:16 (eighteen years ago)

so you are trying to kill me with typos.

― scott seward, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:16 (eighteen years ago)

this confuses also:

"I saw Iggy the other day in The Prestige. Holy shit is he old. Playing Nicolai Tesla of all people. Still with the one weird eye. Fuckin' Bowie."

― scott seward, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:17 (eighteen years ago)

See what I said before about the coffee and the morning. I'm on the West Coast. I got up at 4:00 am today, 3 hrs sleep. I wanna pretend that last one was supposed to be some kinda joek, ha ha, but fuggit. My brain is cheese. Anyway, Nicolai Tesla. What a card.

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:21 (eighteen years ago)

It's Nicola Tesla too. Dude had a girl's name, yo.

He is looking a bit droopy since the heart attack, sadly. And he cancelled his Highline gig, so I'm feeling somewhat pessimistic about the Dame's future at the moment. :-(

― chrissie_, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:44 (eighteen years ago)

All right, that's it... I QUIT THE INTERNETS!

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 8 March 2007 14:50 (eighteen years ago)

The fine print in the full page ad for the album and show in today's Reader says "Mike Watt and Steve Mackay will not be appearing at show (record only)". Anyone know what's up with that?

― Mike Dixn, Friday, 9 March 2007 16:30 (eighteen years ago)

Yes, it means I QUIT THE INTERNETS.

― Pye Poudre, Friday, 9 March 2007 16:46 (eighteen years ago)

(xpost)

What show?

According to Mike Watt's Hoot Page he's playing with them in Switzerland on March 8th and at SXSW the 17th.

― StanM, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:03 (eighteen years ago)

UNPLUGGES. ROCK ACTION ON CONGAS.

― Tim Ellison, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:05 (eighteen years ago)

Oh. Wait, the 8th was yesterday, innit?

Yesterday, in Switzerland: Mike Watt.

http://i15.tinypic.com/2hrg9zk.jpg

― StanM, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:06 (eighteen years ago)

Is Watt playing with his fingers again or did he drop his pick?

― Tim Ellison, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:28 (eighteen years ago)

I thought he had it in his mouth, but that could be his tongue as well

― StanM, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:45 (eighteen years ago)

What show
StanM on Friday, 9 March 2007 18:03 (1 hour ago)

Chicago, April 15th.

― Mike Dixn, Friday, 9 March 2007 19:53 (eighteen years ago)

I originally read this thread title as "STONES to record new album with steve albini"

― darin, Friday, 9 March 2007 19:56 (eighteen years ago)

I'd like to hear that.

― Edward III, Friday, 9 March 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

Mike: strange...

Ask him on his forum?

http://www.maximumwattage.com/phpbb2/viewforum.php?f=7

― StanM, Friday, 9 March 2007 21:06 (eighteen years ago)

Okay, so it seems to have been a mistake. Watt and Mackay are both playing at the Chicago show. Very weird typo.

― Mike Dixn, Tuesday, 13 March 2007 00:28 (eighteen years ago)

I really can't decide:

"My dick is turning into a tree." Brilliant, or horrible?
"Rock critics wouldn't like this at all." Prophesy or bait?
"You can't tell me this is not a suave thing to do." Because it actually is suave, or because of the next line (which suggests you've compromised your integrity because "you'd do it too" and so judge not lest you be judged -- even though it really isn't very suave.)

"I'm Trollin'" -- About ILX boards?

― Mordechai Shinefield, Tuesday, 13 March 2007 01:57 (eighteen years ago)

I am listening to this now on that site that's streaming it and on track 7 right now. I wonder if I can actually say already at this point that I actually think it's the best Stooges album. It's got me thinking it is. Totally pwning so far.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:44 (eighteen years ago)

The poetry....worthy of the best Blag Jesus.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:47 (eighteen years ago)

I've still only heard Idea of Fun apart from live songs I can't remember, I need to get onto this. The minute downside of near infinite free music is finite time to listen to the bastard stuff. I've decided I do like Idea of Fun, flawed though it is. It's not Search & Destroy but nothing else is really.

― Colonel Poo, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:48 (eighteen years ago)

Fuck "Search and Destroy." This album is the true dunce soul of the Stooges.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:49 (eighteen years ago)

OK I'm going to listen to it next week, please don't beat me.

― Colonel Poo, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:52 (eighteen years ago)

Good god, I'm on "Mexican Guy" now.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 01:59 (eighteen years ago)

Whoa

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 02:00 (eighteen years ago)

i love this record

james blount on Tuesday, 6 March 2007 07:43

^^ dude on this thread I'm most relatin' to ^^

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 17:08 (eighteen years ago)

"worthy of the best Blag Jesus"

Better, even. More human.

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 17 March 2007 21:24 (eighteen years ago)

The minute downside of near infinite free music is finite time to listen to the bastard stuff.

Very well said.

― Bimble, Saturday, 17 March 2007 23:52 (eighteen years ago)

blog post

― Tim Ellison, Sunday, 18 March 2007 01:26 (eighteen years ago)

Tim, I'm pretty sure I agree with you about the album. About it being so incredibly "stupid" (to use the terms that Iggy is using) that it works perfectly. Actually, I had to go back to this - http://www.creemmagazine.com/_site/BeatGoesOn/IggyPop/OfPopAndPiesPt001.html - to figure out the language I should be using in coming to grips with this album. After all, it's not just weirdness (though there is a lot of "weirdness" going on) but a kind of aggressive, angry, willful stupidity that's being presenced. Also, there's nothing stupid at all going on at the same time. Which is to say that he can talk about his dick turning into a tree, and then move into evaluating critical poses, and it doesn't feel like he's breaking theme. Reading the lyrics as a detached reader - obviously he's breaking theme considerably (moving from willful stupidity to metacomment). But listening, it feels like he's lumping critical response in with dick-trees - which is a comment in-of-itself. Which I feel is kinda what you're saying when you say, "It's about allowing yourself to maybe - oh my god, oh no - say something directly and allow the organization of poetry to be simple while risking - again, OH NO - that some people, for whatever the hell reason, are going to say that all the songs are stupid on 'this new horrible Stooges album.'"

Also! Because saying the one thing, and letting it naturally flow into the other reads as a kind of poetry - dadaist (because weren't the Stooges always somewhat interested in the dada and surreal?) but also impeccably honest. IE: Were I to interrupt this comment with a completely different comment about ILX readers refusing to read long comments on records they've already made their minds up about (whether that's true or not), that'd be a more honest detour than continuing the theme of the comment. Which isn't to say there's a natural connection, besides the one I'm making in my head. But that dick-trees and critical-response may be intricately linked in Iggy's mind (and now, without fail, in mine as well).

So yeah. I love the album. Not as much as I love Lust for Life, I think. Or rather, in a different way than I love Lust for Life. And if people don't like this album, because it isn't the album they wanted, then they're "Greedy Awful People," and it just makes Iggy 'sad and lonely, baby.' So they should be ashamed.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Sunday, 18 March 2007 09:59 (eighteen years ago)

eh I'm pretty disappointed by this for reasons I can't quite put a finger on. the energy level and commitment are palpable -- the playing's pretty damn fierce for a buncha geezers. what's missing is the psychedelic edge that making-it-up-as-we-stumble-along experimentation of the debut and Funhouse, a quality that is NOT the preserve of youth as oh say Cecil Taylor or Ornette continue to demonstrate. And Iggy's song-writing is the big problem here for me, too self-consciously "dumb" and artlessly tossed off. That's a fine distinction, of course.

in short The Weirdness is not weird enough for this aging fanboy, but it still makes me happy that the Ashetons are bashing away again behind Iggy finally giving this classic band something like their due.

― m coleman, Sunday, 18 March 2007 11:38 (eighteen years ago)

"that making-it-up-as-we-stumble-along experimentation"

4000 hours of funhouse rehearsal tapes notwithstanding...

― scott seward, Sunday, 18 March 2007 15:29 (eighteen years ago)

Shh, you're giving it away!

― Ned Raggett, Sunday, 18 March 2007 15:50 (eighteen years ago)

well scot has a point cause what I listened to of those rehearsals pretty much = the released tracks.

ultimately teh weirdness is just too much straightahead thudd-rockin for my taste. not weird enough.

― m coleman, Sunday, 18 March 2007 16:05 (eighteen years ago)

OTOH I've recently decided that The Idiot/Lust for Life is a career peak/milestone for Iggy & Bowie both.

so maybe in like 25 years I'll decide that this is the best Stooges album ever.

― m coleman, Sunday, 18 March 2007 16:10 (eighteen years ago)

"Not weird enough" - god I love you guys. That's about the best thing I can think of to say about it.

― Bimble, Sunday, 18 March 2007 16:14 (eighteen years ago)

Stuart Berman at PFM just gave the album a 1.0. What I found odd wasn't his review (he found the album stupid - shocking), but how he tried to contrast the album to the first three. He wrotes:

The Stooges' first three albums were a perfect triptych. Each record had its own peculiar atmosphere of dread, but when played back-to-back-to-back they form a complementary arc: black-cloud threat (1969's The Stooges) gives way to fiery holocaust (1970's Funhouse) and a post-apocalyptic zombie dance party (1973's Raw Power).

I wasn't alive then, but I've heard the albums. And they don't strike me as fitting that description at all. If anything, they seem much closer to Weirdness than Berman gives credit. So, I wonder if anyone who remembers could elucidate for me? Am I wrong?

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 09:10 (eighteen years ago)

(He wrotes. God it must be late.)

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 09:10 (eighteen years ago)

I think SB nails the primary difference between the three albums and the new one. Dread. (And committment, and energy, and wit, and malice, and sex, and pretty much everything non-shitty in the universe, but that's another discussion.) I might quibble with the way he characterizes the early records individually, but the he's still 99% OTM.

The Weirdness sounds like a half-decent band trying to sound like a received idea of "The Stooges". In that sense, it's not even as good as The Hellacopters, or early Mudhoney. Maybe a bit more challenging than the former, but not a patch on the latter.

― Pye Poudre, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 16:15 (eighteen years ago)

You gotta be shitting me if you don't think there's committment and energy and wit and malice and sex in The Weirdness.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:35 (eighteen years ago)

his dick it is like tree

― sexyDancer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:38 (eighteen years ago)

dude it ain't even CLOSE to fucking with superfuzz big muff....or supershitty to the max....hellacopters fucking pwned live in the early daze, i saw them bikers blow nashville pussy of the stage in the entry once....

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:40 (eighteen years ago)

See also "The End of Christianity."

x-post

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:41 (eighteen years ago)

and nashville pussy was pretty great at one time, until the let them eat pussy full length which pretty much suxx and then the whole thing got real schticky.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:41 (eighteen years ago)

or BAD schticky instead of good schticky.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:41 (eighteen years ago)

"The Stooges' first three albums were a perfect triptych. Each record had its own peculiar atmosphere of dread, but when played back-to-back-to-back they form a complementary arc: black-cloud threat (1969's The Stooges) gives way to fiery holocaust (1970's Funhouse) and a post-apocalyptic zombie dance party (1973's Raw Power)."

I'd go along with this! Maybe not exactly how I would put it, but it sounds about right.

― scott seward, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:43 (eighteen years ago)

"You gotta be shitting me if you don't think there's committment and energy and wit and malice and sex in The Weirdness."

There are certainly plenty of songs that awkwardly, embarrassingly address these subjects. But that's not the same thing. At all.

― Pye Poudre, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:48 (eighteen years ago)

there's a brutality in the first 3 records missing from the weirdness.

― Edward III, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:52 (eighteen years ago)

I blame albini

― sexyDancer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:53 (eighteen years ago)

haha

in retrospect i guess i shouldn't have wished for more than skull ring w/a slightly cooler band.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 17:59 (eighteen years ago)

I've just been listening to it on the computer but I think I like the production. Rock Action sounds great.

And I don't give a damn about brutality. This is a far more human and mature record than the first three Stooges albums.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:01 (eighteen years ago)

"mature"

http://richardmcguire.com/travel/asia/indiabw/old-man.jpg

― scott seward, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:02 (eighteen years ago)

And there actually isn't any more BRUTALITY on The Stooges than there is on The Weirdness, anyway.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:04 (eighteen years ago)

Yes, definitely, mature. Much better lyric writing skills.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:05 (eighteen years ago)

I'm totally on board with Tim. I think the album is incredible. In one of Bang's early Stooge's reviews (it's in Psychotic Reactions) he writes:

The Stooges also carry a strong element of sickness in their music, a crazed quaking uncertainty, an errant foolishness that effectively mirrors the absurdity and desperation of the times, but I believe they also carry a strong element of cure, a post-derangement sanity.

I definitely think The Weirdness is in that tradition - it has sickness, uncertainity, foolishness - even "My dick turned into a tree." which is so absurd, it becomes the post-derangement cure. It's like the response to postmodernity is this particular kind of insanity - and personally, I think Weirdness is a lot more accessible musically than the older albums - which makes it more of a response to the accessibility of the "weirdness" of the times, not less of one.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:18 (eighteen years ago)

Dude, I'm with you, but could you unpack that last sentence a little?

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:24 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah... I'm just saying that the "weirdness" we experience today if a very accessible weirdness. It's not like Surrealism or Dadaism where you need to be in an intellectual elite to be apart of the conversation. You can stop someone on the street and ask them they're opinion on... let's say soldiers shoving things in Muslim prisoner's asses in Guantanamo Bay - and they'd say, "Yeah, that's fucking weird." So I think that while Bangs was OTM about the first three albums, they weren't quite as obvious as this current one. They may have been weird, but they were also (to quote Berman) dreadful, fiery, "black-cloud threat" (whatever that means). This is so unapologetically weird, so stupid, that it's an ideal reflection of the moment. Especially when you discuss all the pop culture aspects that are really weird, or really stupid. Like, "The Weirdness" is a perfect response to that midget-dating reality show - or MTV's Pimp-My-Mom. It's not intellectually weird, it's stupidly weird - which means it's both more accessible, but also more appropriate to the moment.

Let me know if that unpacks it enough...

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:32 (eighteen years ago)

(And yeah. They're = Their. I'm sure there are other typoes)

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 18:33 (eighteen years ago)

And there actually isn't any more BRUTALITY on The Stooges than there is on The Weirdness, anyway.

haven't found anything as flattening on teh weirdness as when the bass comes in on "ann" or even the opening of "I wanna be your dog" but y'know diff strokes fer diff folks n all that.

― Edward III, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:19 (eighteen years ago)

I know I'm just a broken record, crackling on about how awful this record is, but I'm having problems with this: "I think Weirdness is a lot more accessible musically than the older albums - which makes it more of a response to the accessibility of the 'weirdness' of the times..."

The Stooges first run of albums were released 1969-1974, probably conceived starting a few years before that. The Summer of Love. Woodstock. Vietnam atrocities on TV every night. Watergate. The Watts riots. The Black Panter Party. The Cuban Missile Crisis and the assassinations of the Kennedys and MLK. Patty Hearst. TV Dinners. Shopping Malls. Laugh-In. Sgt. Pepper's. Long-hair pinkos and Peter Max posters going head-to-head with flat-topped 50s dads.

It was a really weird era, and everyone knew it. The weirdness was right on the surface, the disconnect between TV and reality, the psychedelic awfulness of suburban life, the way meaninful and meaningless things fucked each other into an incomprehensible soup. And maybe the Stooges' response (back then) was a period response, in that it was legitimately pissed off and confused. They presented this pose of nihilist apathy, but their music wasn't apathetic at all ("We Will Fall" notwithstanding). Their music was an idealistic, juvenile response to the fucked-up weirdness of the world.

And maybe the Stooges of today reflect our times, in that they're burned out by "The Weirdness". It's all just a goof now. Something to trip out on or crack jokes about. Something trivial and common. Certainly nothing to get all worked up over. So now the apathy is genuine, stripped of the embittered idealism that once gave it bite. And hey, that chick is fuckin' hot...

I see the progression. I just don't find it particularly interesting.

― Pye Poudre, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:43 (eighteen years ago)

tim defends pile of crap, film at 11

― am0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:54 (eighteen years ago)

How you can see apathy in Iggy's lyrics on this album is beyond me.

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:55 (eighteen years ago)

Oh what a clever response amon!

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:56 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah. Apathy might be a better word than accessible - but I like it for precisely that reason.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:56 (eighteen years ago)

I see it more as an intense investigation of life. Isn't there some line on the album about "truth-seeking?"

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 19:57 (eighteen years ago)

;)

― am0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:00 (eighteen years ago)

Pye OTM.

― fife, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:00 (eighteen years ago)

it's not so bad if you pretend it's not by the stooges

― latebloomer, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:03 (eighteen years ago)

I suspect Tim Ellison is being entirely facetious. Or at least ironic.

― fife, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:03 (eighteen years ago)

See, I don't think they are being apathetic - certainly not in the same way Green Day's Dookie was (sitting on your couch, masturbating and smoking pot). I think they're addressing the apathy over the weirdness - they're investigating the affects that apathy has over us. I don't know that I can think of lyrical proofs off-hand (I'm sitting in a class at the moment), but in the lyrics "It's the end of Christianity / It's the end of Christianity / It's the end of you and me.": First, the way the beats work, the upbeat is on "It's the end of," and the downbeat on "Christianity." (with a slight upbeat on "anity") which - besides giving a very obvious evocation of "insanity" or "lunacy" etc - makes a point about how the end-ofs work. The point isn't the Christianity, the point is that something is ending. By placing the Christianity on a downbeat, you get the feeling like that's the most insignificant part of the statement. And when he says "The end of you and me," he's clarifying that it has nothing to do with Christianity at all. IMHO, that's a pretty subtle statement about how religion is currently operating (which is to say: the interplay between our killing off of religion dovetails with our complaints about lack of spirituality which also speaks to fanaticism about end-of-times and apocalyptic beliefs). Anyway, I think I could argue this better if I could listen to the music at the moment, so maybe I'll clean up the idea later tonight.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:04 (eighteen years ago)

Oh, I disagree with that. I think the song is about monogamy, so Christianity is entirely significant to the subject. The downbeats, fwiw, fall on the word "end" in "it's the end of" and the syllable "an" in the word "Christianity."

― Tim Ellison, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:08 (eighteen years ago)

See, here's the problem with writing music crit without being able to listen to the music. I was trying to do it from memory. Anyway, outside a disagreement about what the song is about, I completely agree with Tim that the album is brilliant. And I'm actually enjoying it more than I enjoyed Fun House when I heard it for the first time.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:11 (eighteen years ago)

alright tim, you've at least convinced me to listen to this again and see if it sounds better than some turd band from bumfuck the third time thru.

― M@tt He1ges0n, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:17 (eighteen years ago)

It's certainly catchy as hell.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Wednesday, 21 March 2007 20:17 (eighteen years ago)

So, all the backlash positivism made me wanna revisit my first impressions. I was wondering, is it really that bad? And it isn't. Not quite. It's definitely got its strengths, and at least two solid songs. The more you consider it on its own (rather than in the shadow of the Trinity) the better it sounds. Still, it's pretty crummy. Not so bad that it deserves a 1-out-of-10 rating, but it's certainly no better than a 5. Track-by-track for the first half:

My Idea of Fun
More like "real rock 'n' roll" than anything Iggy's done in ages. First few bars are totally killer. Comes tearing outta the speakers all red in tooth and claw (initially sounding more like Birdman than the Stooges, but that's hardly a problem). Eventually resolves into what could be a lost Funhouse outtake. Lead guitar is amazingly brutal, astringent, by far the best thing about the song, and Iggy evinces a stronger commitment to the material than I've been giving him credit for. Sure-footed and on-point from front to back. Every part of the song works with the rest. And while the lyrics remain wince-inducing, I can sublimate Iggy's nonsense into the roaring blur with no problems.

You Can't Have Friends
I don't wanna get too far into it, but this is cruddy in roughly equal proportion to Idea of Fun's goodness. The funky wah-wah guitar is nowhere near as compelling as the more metallic stuff. Recalls early Gaye Bykers on Acid, and that is a problem. The lyrics, ranting about how fame and money make friendship impossible, are even worse -- crushingly obvious. Half an earworm in a sing-song sorta way, but that isn't half enough.

ATM
See above. The lyrics are wearing me down. I feel like I should be able to rise above, 'cuz the music here rocks convincingly, but I can't. The phrasing is terrible, too, choking off anything that might work in spite of the words. Sorry, but this is generic bar-band fodder, and it shoulda been left on the cutting-room floor.

Trollin'
Best song on the album. And the only one where the forced stupidity of the lyrics really works (or, well, almost works...). I fucking LOVE "I see your long legs riding your Lees / I see your hair as energy." Crafty and clever. On the other hand, "my dick is turning into a tree" just sucks all the air outta the room. You get the same effect in the next few lines: "I got the top down on my Cadillac / My Stooges t-shirt is riding my back / Rock critics wouldn't like this at all." Okay, that does the idiot-savant thing just fine. Then along comes, "I guess my faith is riding my balls," to blow down the house of cards. There's a fine line between clever and stupid, but Iggy won't even admit it exists. And while the verse is catchy as hell, the chorus is kind of a snooze. [Note: this is the point at which Albini's trademark boxy, chunka-chunka drum production starts to get on my nerves. Fine for a single song; grating over the long haul.]

The Weirdness
This gets very nice towards the end, but the first few minutes tread water. While it's not my new favorite song, I do like it quite a bit. At least it's not another mortifying fake-Stooge ripoff (Friends, ATM, F'n'F), and therefore it makes me wish they'd stretched out a little more overall. Points towards the better record that might have been.

Free 'n' Freaky
I've said enough about this song already. I fucking hate it. It makes me not want to listen to the record anymore.

Etc. High points have been hit. Lowest of the lows still to come…

― Pye Poudre, Thursday, 22 March 2007 22:34 (eighteen years ago)

Fwiw (partly because I don't have the energy for bringing any pissing contest here back to life), I'll be posting my comments on the new Stooges album (which I don't like much so far, give or take the sax parts) here and here only:

http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=41&threadid=56329#unread

― xhuxk, Saturday, 24 March 2007 17:39 (eighteen years ago)

In the midnight hour, baby
When the truth comes down
I don't need no doctor
Hangin' around
Can I get a witness?
Can I come on strong?
Every tricky rock star
Just rubs me wrong

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 24 March 2007 17:57 (eighteen years ago)

Also, best fucking lyric about Iraq war yet by a million miles, surely. Iggy rules:

My sister went to war
She tied a guy up on a leash
I think about it sometimes
When I'm sittin' on the beach

― Tim Ellison, Saturday, 24 March 2007 18:02 (eighteen years ago)

i don't have much desire to listen to this, but i can say this: i'm sure as hell glad the internet didn't exist in 1969.

― hstencil, Saturday, 24 March 2007 18:13 (eighteen years ago)

hahaha did you exist in 1969?

― m coleman, Saturday, 24 March 2007 20:50 (eighteen years ago)

I think it's absolutely hilarious that people are trying to find such a deep meaning in Iggy's lyrics, especially from THIS album. That Pye guy upthread nearly had me in stitches. If Iggy saw this he'd be having a good laugh at all of you right now.

― Reatards Unite, Sunday, 25 March 2007 15:46 (eighteen years ago)

"If"?

― M.V., Sunday, 25 March 2007 15:50 (eighteen years ago)

in the midnight hour babe..
more, more, more...

― Bimble, Monday, 26 March 2007 00:43 (eighteen years ago)

Yet to see a comment on the extremes of this factor:

"You Can't Have Friends" - 1:58
"Free and Freaky" - 2:13
"Greedy Awful People" - 1:45

Plus three songs in the 2:30-2:45 range.

― Tim Ellison, Tuesday, 27 March 2007 23:38 (eighteen years ago)

^^the minutemen influence via mike watt?

― m coleman, Wednesday, 28 March 2007 10:06 (eighteen years ago)

I agree, Albini is an overated non-talent who artists record with just to get some "cred". His skills as an engineer are remedial at best.

― yoko0no, Thursday, 29 March 2007 16:53 (eighteen years ago)

three weeks pass...

So what is their version of "I wanna be your man" like?

(it's on the extra 12" in the LP set)

― Mark G, Monday, 23 April 2007 15:32 (eighteen years ago)

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