Preliminaires
The Age
Friday June 19, 2009
Preliminaires Iggy Pop (EMI) 4/5IGGY Pop's decision to record a jazz album based on French author Michel Houellebecq's 2005 novel The Possibility of an Island may sound like an incongruous fit akin to Simon and Garfunkel doing metal. But as the bookish godfather of punk rock proved on 2005's paean to New York, Avenue B, his deep caramel baritone croon fits the genre. And surely it is a better option than another failed attempt at living up to the pro-punk rock of his formidable old band, the Stooges. Pop says the left turn came because he was sick of hearing "idiot thugs with guitars". It's a good move. This is his best album since 1993's American Caesar. Coming on like a leather-jacketed Serge Gainsbourg and singing in English and French, he dabbles in Dixieland jazz, the dark electro of his 1977 album The Idiot, and the electric guitar comes out for the hilarious Nice to be Dead ("it's nice to be underground/ free of the ugly sounds of life"). It may have taken the tragic passing of Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton to help him move on, but Pop's proved he's got plenty of tricks left up his sleeve. -- PATRICK DONOVAN
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