C.A.T: The Stooges

I was gonna write about Dylan’s Nashville Skyline (My second favorite Dylan album after Highway 61 Revisited) but after dragging my feet for a day or so I just wasn’t sure what to say about it, another time perhaps. Then when I noticed it was Iggy Pop’s birthday I was like “Well this is a no brainer.” Not to mention I was just rockin’ out to this a couple of days ago.

So it’s the debut record from the Stooges, the second Stooges album to be featured in our Classic Album Tuesday segment (Thursday in this case) and the third time now for Iggy. Now my liking for the muzak of Iggy Pop doesn’t go back that far (like a couple months) but I’ve always had a great deal of respect for the clown prince of rock. He’s charismatic with his bad boy sneer and relaxed “don’t-give-a-shit” delivery. They just don’t make frontmen like that anymore but you can’t count out the edgy musicianship from his fellow stooges either. Ron Asheton delivers track after track of sludgy riffage and ooften dabbles with some well deserved wah-wah. The rhythm section is classic rock 101 with some crunchy drums from Ron’s brother Scott and bass duties being filled by Dave Alexander, the first in a line of drug addicted bass players (That’s rock and roll).

But what really rock my socks off is the fact that thiscame out in 1969. Aside from maybe MC5 it’s hard to think of many other bands from the 60s that truly paved a way for punk (maybe even metal too). Sure there was a handful of pretty raw garage rock bands, but only so many of them were ya know, any good. I’ve delved fairly deep into the world of late 60s hard rock and these guys are still some of the best if not the best of their raw rock niche.

The Stooges just exude coolness without even trying. Sometimes it’s just the most simple things that have the most compelling effect. Just look at the lyrics to 1969 it’s like one sentence, yet every word carries with it so much angst and power. Now that’s balls-to-the-walls….

Favorite Tracks: “1969”, “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, “No Fun”