Iggy & The Stooges “Raw Power” is still my favorite classic record these days. I had been aware of Stooges music after first seeing pictures of Iggy painted silver and walking on the hands of the audience, chipped teeth and snarling. It was obviously taking what I was liking about rock freakishness and putting it into real action. The drama of Bowie and glam seemed all at once tame after seeing this image. I searched out the LPs I could find which were the first two and they were certainly monolithic and numbing. Especially in context of what was happening in the rock scene at that time – be it Emerson , Lake and Palmer or Helen Reddy. Only Alice Cooper seemed relative but even that group had a safety net of theatre that the Stooges seemed to incinerate with sheer wickedness. I had heard that a new Stooges record was to be released and that Bowie produced it and Iggy had changed his last name to “Popp” and this was all too exciting. Of course I had absolutely no one to share this excitement with. I happened upon Raw Power after seeing it in the department store I would go to to look at records. Buying records was a privelege as they cost money and as a young teenager in the early 70s money wasn’t exactly plentiful. But I did buy Raw Power. I knew I had to. The cover with Iggy bare chested, in silver lamé trousers staring off into some rock n roll psycho void had me in a heartbeat. And the back cover with the various photos of the band in glam anxious repose were all the invitation I need to the future. To top it all off there were the electric song titles. ‘Search and Destroy’, ‘Gimme Danger’, ‘Penetration”. ‘Shake Appeal’, ‘You’re Pretty Face Is Going To Hell’. On the shrink wrap was a sticker that had the LP title on it in dripping Munsters lettering. It was all too much. And the record from beginning to end was a masterpiece. It took the howling thud of the first two LPs and zapped it with some new found fire. The lead guitarist was James Williamson, not on the previous LPs, and his licks were so sizzling and treble piercing that I thought they would sonically slice my soul open. The lyrics “look out honey cuz I’m using technology…” in one snarl decimated everything around them. A lot of it was due to the delivery of Iggy’s vocal – it was as if the flaming voice of rock n roll had found it’s Rosemary’s Baby to deliver us from nowheresville. And by God, it did.

É isso aí: Thurston tá blogando. Já falou de disco solo novo, jogou umas fotos velhas, comentou de uma colaboração com a Yoko e desenterrou uns poemas que fez quando era adolescente. Pouca coisa – o maior post é este comentário sobre o Raw Power, dos Stooges, que eu colei aí em cima. Quero ver colocar músicas próprias pra download – ou abrir o processo de gravação do disco novo, sei lá.

Tags: blog, sonic youth, stooges, thurston moore