Top Of The Pops The Story Of 1990

[Nga Sagastume]

James Newell Osterberg Jr. (born April 21, 1947), known professionally as Iggy Pop, is an American singer, musician, songwriter, actor and radio broadcaster. He was the vocalist and lyricist of proto-punk band the Stooges, who were formed in 1967 and have disbanded and reunited many times since.[1] Often called the "Godfather of Punk",[2][3] he was named one of the 50 Great Voices by NPR. In 2010, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Stooges. Pop also received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2020 for his solo work.[4]

Initially playing a raw, primitive style of rock and roll (progressing later towards more experimental and aggressive rock), the Stooges sold few records in their original incarnation and gained a reputation for their confrontational performances, which often involved acts of self-mutilation by Pop.[5] He had a long collaborative relationship and friendship with David Bowie over the course of his career, beginning with the Stooges' album Raw Power in 1973. Both musicians went to West Berlin to wean themselves off their respective drug addictions and Pop began his solo career by collaborating with Bowie on the 1977 albums The Idiot and Lust for Life, Pop usually contributing the lyrics. Throughout his career, he is well known for his outrageous and unpredictable stage antics, poetic lyrics and distinctive voice.[6][7][8] He was one of the first performers to do a stage-dive and popularized the activity.[9][10] Pop, who traditionally (but not exclusively) performs bare-chested, also performed such stage theatrics as rolling around in broken glass and exposing himself to the crowd.[10]

Pop's music has encompassed a number of styles over the course of his career, including garage rock, punk rock, hard rock, heavy metal, art rock, new wave, grunge, jazz, blues and electronic.[11][12] Though his popularity has fluctuated, many of Pop's songs have become well known, including "Search and Destroy" and "I Wanna Be Your Dog" by the Stooges, and his solo hits "Lust for Life", "The Passenger" and "Real Wild Child (Wild One)". In 1990, he recorded his only Top 40 U.S. hit, "Candy", a duet with B-52's singer Kate Pierson. Pop's song "China Girl" became more widely known when it was re-recorded by co-writer Bowie, who released it as the second single from his most commercially successful album, Let's Dance (1983). Bowie re-recorded and performed many of Pop's songs throughout his career.

Although Pop has had limited commercial success, he has remained a culture icon and a significant influence on a wide range of musicians in numerous genres. The Stooges' album Raw Power has proved an influence on artists such as Sex Pistols,[13] the Smiths,[14] and Nirvana.[15] His solo album The Idiot has been cited as a major influence on a number of post-punk, electronic and industrial artists including Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails and Joy Division,[16] and was described by Siouxsie Sioux as a "re-affirmation that our suspicions were true: the man is a genius."[17]

Osterberg began to play drums in the fifth grade, first starting with rubber pads glued to plywood, before his parents bought him a drum set.[22] In a 2007 Rolling Stone interview, he explained his relationship with his parents and their contribution to his music:

Once I hit junior high in Ann Arbor, I began going to school with the son of the president of Ford Motor Company, with kids of wealth and distinction. But I had a wealth that beat them all. I had the tremendous investment my parents made in me. I got a lot of care. They helped me explore anything I was interested in. This culminated in their evacuation from the master bedroom in the trailer, because that was the only room big enough for my drum kit. They gave me their bedroom.[23]

Osterberg began his music career as a drummer in various high school bands in Ann Arbor, Michigan, including The Iguanas, who covered several records such as Bo Diddley's "Mona" in 1965.[24] He then began exploring local blues-style bands such as the Prime Movers (with brothers Dan and Michael Erlewine), which he joined at 18 years old. The Prime Movers gave him the nickname "Iggy" for having played in The Iguanas.[25] According to biographer Jim Ambrose, the two years he spent in the band made him aware of "art, politics, and experimentation".[26]

Osterberg eventually dropped out of the University of Michigan[27] and moved to Chicago to learn more about blues. While in Chicago, he played drums in blues clubs, helped by Sam Lay (formerly of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band) who shared his connections with Pop.[28] Inspired by Chicago blues as well as bands like The Sonics, MC5 and The Doors, he formed The Psychedelic Stooges. The band was composed of Osterberg on vocals, Ron Asheton on guitar, Asheton's brother Scott on drums, and Dave Alexander on bass. Their first show was played at a Halloween party at a house in Detroit, Michigan. Members of the MC5 were also in attendance. Osterberg became interested in Ron Asheton after seeing him perform in the Chosen Few (a covers band), believing "I've never met a convincing musician that didn't look kind of ill and kind of dirty, and Ron had those two things covered!"[29] The three nicknamed Osterberg "Pop" after local character, Jim Popp,[30] whom he resembled.[31]

The seeds of Pop's stage persona were sown when he saw the Doors perform in 1967 at the University of Michigan and was amazed by the stage antics and antagonism displayed by singer Jim Morrison.[10] Morrison's extreme behavior, while performing in a popular band, inspired the young Pop to push the boundaries of stage performance. Other influences on Pop's vocals and persona were Mick Jagger and James Brown:

I attended two concerts by the Doors. The first one I attended was early on and they had not gotten their shit together yet. That show was a big, big, big influence on me. They had just had their big hit, "Light My Fire" and the album had taken off. ... So, here's this guy, out of his head on acid, dressed in leather with his hair all oiled and curled. The stage was tiny and it was really low. It got confrontational. I found it really interesting. I loved the performance ... Part of me was like, "Wow, this is great. He's really pissing people off and he's lurching around making these guys angry." People were rushing the stage and Morrison's going "Fuck you. You blank, blank, blank." You can fill in your sexual comments yourself. The other half of it was that I thought, "If they've got a hit record out and they can get away with this, then I have no fucking excuse not to get out on stage with my band." It was sort of the case of, "Hey, I can do that." There really was some of that in there.[32]

In addition to Jim Morrison and The Doors' influence on the band, Pop also attributes the Stooges getting jump-started after seeing an all-girls rock band from Princeton, New Jersey, called The Untouchable. In a 1995 interview with Bust, he relates:

And the other thing was we went to New York. We had gone to New York a couple of months before that just to check out the scene, and we had never been to a place like New York ... we went down around Eighth Street there where all the young tourists hang out, and we met these girls from New Jersey, from Princeton, they had a band called The Untouchable, and we're like, "Oh, you've got a band, sure, ha ha ha," and they said "Well, come to our house and see us play." And we didn't have anywhere to crash, and they played for us, and they completely rocked, and we were really ashamed.

In 1968, one year after their live debut and now dubbed the Psychedelic Stooges, the band signed with Elektra Records, again following in the footsteps of The Doors, who were Elektra's biggest act at the time (according to Pop, guitarist Ron Asheton called Moe Howard to see if it was all right to call the band "The Stooges", to which Howard responded by merely saying "I don't care what they call themselves, as long as they're not The Three Stooges!" and hung up the phone). Pop himself told the story in the 2016 Jim Jarmusch documentary film about The Stooges, Gimme Danger. The Stooges' first album The Stooges (on which Pop was credited as "Iggy Stooge") was produced by John Cale in New York in 1969. Both it and the follow-up, Fun House, produced by Don Gallucci in Los Angeles in 1970, sold poorly. Though the release of Fun House did not receive the recognition expected, it was later ranked No. 191 in Rolling Stone's '500 Greatest Albums of All Time' in 2003.[33] Shortly after the release of Fun House, the group disbanded because of Pop's worsening heroin addiction.

In 1971, without a record deal, the Stooges kept performing in small clubs with a five-piece lineup that included both Ron Asheton and James Williamson on guitars and Jimmy Recca on bass, Pop having fired Dave Alexander the previous year when he turned up for a gig unable to play because of his chronic alcoholism. That year Pop and David Bowie met at Max's Kansas City, a nightclub and restaurant in New York City.[34] Pop's career received a boost from his relationship with Bowie when Bowie decided in 1972 to produce an album with him in England. With Williamson signed on as guitarist, the search began for a rhythm section. However, since neither Pop nor Williamson were satisfied with any players in England, they decided to re-unite the Stooges. Ron Asheton grudgingly moved from guitar to bass. The recording sessions produced the rock landmark Raw Power. After its release, Scott Thurston was added to the band on keyboards/electric piano and Bowie continued his support, but Pop's drug problem persisted. The Stooges' last show in 1974 ended in a fight between the band and a group of bikers, documented on the album Metallic K.O. Drug abuse stalled Pop's career again for several years.

After the Stooges' second breakup, Pop made recordings with James Williamson, but these were not released until 1977 (as Kill City, credited jointly to Pop and Williamson).[14] Pop was unable to control his drug use and checked himself into a mental institution, the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute, to try to clean up. Bowie was one of his few visitors, continuing to support his friend and collaborator. In 1976, Bowie took Pop as his companion on the Station to Station tour. This was Pop's first exposure to large-scale professional touring, and he was impressed, particularly with Bowie's work ethic. Following a March 21, 1976, show, Bowie and Pop were arrested together for marijuana possession in Rochester, New York, although charges were later dropped.[35]

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