Iggy Pop

Recognized widely as punk’s Godfather, Iggy Pop forged an ecstatic, ritualistic stage presence together with a gritty, street-level rawness that positioned him among rock’s most pivotal innovators at the moment he launched the Stooges in 1967. Scarcely any act operating in punk—or in any branch of adventurous, hard-edged rock—escaped the imprint of the three studio albums the Stooges issued from 1969 to 1973, above all 1970’s Fun House and 1973’s Raw Power. Once the Stooges initially dissolved, Pop pursued an equally uncompromising yet far broader solo path whose earliest two efforts, both overseen by David Bowie, 1977’s The Idiot and Lust for Life, helped chart the course for post-punk. Across the greater part of the 1970s and 1980s he tested numerous stylistic routes for his fiercely independent outlook, yet discovered an effective balance between personal expression and mainstream appeal on 1990’s Brick by Brick, an album that yielded the hit single “Candy,” a duet with Kate Pierson of the B-52’s. Entering the 2000s he fused sharper social observation with fervent hard rock, a direction that peaked with the Stooges’ 2003 reunion; alongside relentless touring the revived lineup produced two further studio albums, The Weirdness (2007) and Ready to Die (2013). Following the Stooges’ final dissolution he joined forces with Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age for an album that echoed his earlier work with Bowie, 2016’s Post Pop Depression, while also venturing beyond rock on the Euro-pop-leaning Preliminaires of 2009, the ambient guitar and electronic textures of 2019’s Free, and an experimental project with composer Catherine Graindorge, 2022’s The Dictator.

Born April 21, 1947, in Muskegon, Michigan, James Newell Osterberg grew up with his parents inside a trailer park near Ann Arbor in adjacent Ypsilanti. Drawn to rock & roll as well as the repetitive, mechanical noises of his father’s electric razor and the automobile factories surrounding Metro Detroit, Osterberg took up drums and assembled his first group, the Iguanas, during the early 1960s. Influenced by the Rolling Stones, he absorbed the blues and formed a comparable band called the Prime Movers after finishing high school in 1965. A short enrollment at the University of Michigan proved unsuccessful, prompting a move to Chicago, where he performed on drums with local blues musicians.

Rock & roll nevertheless remained his central passion, and soon after returning to Ann Arbor he resolved to start another band. This time he stepped away from the drum kit to become the frontman, drawing inspiration from Lou Reed of the Velvet Underground and Jim Morrison of the Doors. He sought players who embraced his vision of music that would be primitive, sexually charged, aggressive, and repetitive, invoking his childhood memories of electric razors and assembly lines as sonic reference points. In 1967 he reconnected with high-school acquaintance guitarist Ron Asheton, who recruited his brother Scott on drums and bassist Dave Alexander, thereby forming the Psychedelic Stooges. Although their sound required time to coalesce—they first experimented with unconventional objects such as empty oil drums and vacuums before settling on conventional instruments—the quartet meshed naturally with other high-energy Detroit acts like the MC5 and quickly became a regional draw.

Around this period the band shortened its name to the Stooges while Osterberg adopted the stage persona Iggy Pop. Under that name he performed with possessed intensity, nightly entering the crowd to confront spectators and working himself into such a state that he regularly finished shows bloodied from assorted cuts and abrasions. Elektra Records signed the quartet in 1968, releasing their self-titled debut the following year and the follow-up Fun House in 1970. Though both LPs sold modestly at the time, they later attained classic status and are widely credited with igniting punk rock.

Public indifference and mounting heroin addictions led Elektra to drop the Stooges in 1971, a decision that precipitated the band’s breakup that same year. One of their most devoted admirers, David Bowie, located the newly abstinent singer and persuaded him to resume performing. Pop recruited guitarist James Williamson, who had briefly played with the Stooges before their split; after signing with Bowie’s Mainman management and relocating to England, they eventually rejoined the Asheton brothers, with Ron switching from guitar to bass.

Columbia Records signed the reconstituted lineup, and hoping to mirror Bowie’s commercial ascent the Stooges crafted another punk landmark, the ferociously explosive Raw Power. Pop’s ambition for the third album was uncompromising: he aimed to produce a record so overpowering that it would physically assault listeners emerging from the speakers. Although the finished LP did not reach that extreme, it came close, with Bowie contributing as producer. Once more the release failed commercially. By 1974 Pop and most of the Stooges had relapsed into heavy drug use, and with their profile waning the band disbanded for good.

After a period of homelessness on the streets of Hollywood that included an abortive attempt to form a group with former Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek, Iggy Pop voluntarily entered the Neuropsychiatric Institute in Los Angeles. While hospitalized he tried writing and recording new material with Williamson, yet no label expressed interest and the two parted ways. The completed demo recordings later appeared on the 1977 album Kill City and again on the 2005 compilation Penetration, which gathered numerous widely circulated demos, outtakes, and alternate mixes from the Raw Power sessions.

During his hospital stay another longtime friend visited: David Bowie, whose own career continued to flourish. Bowie invited Pop to join him on the Station to Station tour, and their rapport proved so strong that both relocated to Berlin in late 1976, where Bowie helped Pop obtain a solo contract with RCA. Having grown fascinated with European electronic music such as Kraftwerk and Can, Bowie later acknowledged using Pop as a testing ground for The Idiot and Lust for Life, both released in 1977 and co-written and produced by Bowie. These albums outsold Pop’s earlier Stooges work, particularly in the U.K., where the emerging punk scene already regarded him as an icon; Bowie further supported him by playing keyboards on the ensuing world tour. A live document, TV Eye (1977 Live), was subsequently released. Shortly afterward Pop ended his professional association with Bowie and proceeded independently.

Joining Arista Records, Pop reunited once more with James Williamson for 1979’s New Values, initiating a sequence of stylistically diverse releases on which he attempted to recast himself as a new-wave artist: Soldier (1980), Party (1981), and Zombie Birdhouse (1982). Also in 1982 he published his autobiography I Need More, a candid chronicle of rock excess that traced his story from its beginnings through the present. Despite this productivity he again succumbed to addiction and withdrew from public view for an extended period to regain stability, during which Bowie scored a major hit with a remake of the Pop/Bowie composition “China Girl,” originally recorded on The Idiot. Pop resurfaced in 1986, signing with A&M and issuing the Bowie-produced Blah Blah Blah, which contained his first U.S. hit single, a moderate success with the cover “Real Wild Child.” Instinct, released in 1988, found him exploring hard rock and heavy metal alongside ex-Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones; its track “Cold Metal” received a Grammy nomination for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance. His debut for Virgin, 1990’s Brick by Brick, became his first U.S. gold-certified album and yielded the Top 20 single “Candy,” a duet with the B-52’s Kate Pierson.

Just as a generation of punk bands had looked to him in the mid-1970s, the early 1990s saw history repeat when Seattle Stooges disciples such as Nirvana, Mudhoney, and Soundgarden emerged. Numerous acts covered Pop or Stooges songs during this period, including Slayer, Duran Duran, Guns N’ Roses, R.E.M., and Tom Jones, while Pop himself delivered another strong solo album, 1993’s American Caesar. In 1996 he sought to recapture the Stooges’ visceral approach on Naughty Little Doggie and scored another hit when the nearly twenty-year-old “Lust for Life” figured prominently in the film Trainspotting. Throughout the decade he also pursued acting, securing small roles in Cry-Baby, Dead Man, and The Crow: City of Angels as well as a recurring part on the television series The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Although he had no involvement, the 1998 film Velvet Goldmine was widely understood to draw from the early-1970s relationship between Bowie and Pop, with Ewan McGregor’s character Curt Wild modeled on Iggy’s Stooges-era persona.

With countless new rock bands citing the Stooges as a primary influence by the late 1990s, Iggy began to revisit the band’s catalog. He personally remixed a newly remastered edition of Raw Power in 1997 after the long-missing original master tapes resurfaced, restoring the album closer to his intended sonic assault. Another related volume, the oral history Please Kill Me, appeared around the same time and detailed the Stooges’ trajectory through extensive interviews with surviving members. The year 1999 proved especially active: Pop was profiled in a VH1 Behind the Music episode, and he released the restrained solo album Avenue B. That more polished direction proved temporary, however, as demonstrated by the aggressive rock of 2001’s Beat ‘Em Up.

After an earlier, unfulfilled promise of a Stooges reunion in the late 1990s, Pop fulfilled the commitment in 2003, enlisting Ron Asheton and Scott Asheton to co-write and record four tracks for his album Skull Ring and leading the reconstituted Stooges on a brief but enthusiastically received tour, with Mike Watt filling in for the late Dave Alexander on bass and the set list dominated by material from The Stooges and Fun House. In 2004 Iggy appeared in Jim Jarmusch’s Coffee and Cigarettes. Following the January 2005 release of Penetration, he issued the career-spanning retrospective A Million in Prizes: The Anthology, which comprised a 37-track CD, a previously unreleased live DVD, and essays on his legacy contributed by figures including Bowie and Lou Reed. Another compilation, Where the Faces Shine, followed the next year.

Iggy sustained visibility in subsequent years through appearances on an album by Praxis, vocals on the Teddybears track “Punkrocker,” performances of several Madonna songs at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, and television advertisements for the British insurer Swiftcover. Back in Ann Arbor, however, Ron Asheton suffered a fatal heart attack in early 2009, depriving Pop of his closest friend and destabilizing the Stooges’ future. Nevertheless, Pop released the solo album Preliminaires that May, drawing inspiration from jazz and the novels of Michel Houellebecq. In 2010 he and the remaining Stooges were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Iggy continued touring with the Stooges—now featuring James Williamson on guitar—through 2010 and 2011 while also pursuing solo side projects, among them collaborations with the Lilies and with Ke$ha, plus the 2012 album Après, on which he interpreted French standards and the Beatles’ “Michelle.” In 2013 he fully embraced the Raw Power-era Stooges sound, touring and releasing Ready to Die in April. Following the death of drummer Scott Asheton in 2014 the band quietly disbanded, and when Pop next toured the United States in 2015 he did so as a solo artist backed by a different ensemble.

A surprise January 2016 announcement revealed that Pop and Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age had written an album together with assistance from Dean Fertita and Matt Helders of Arctic Monkeys. Recorded in secrecy and financed independently, Post Pop Depression (Loma Vista) included the single “Gardenia” and was supported by a short tour featuring live backing from Troy Van Leeuwen and Matt Sweeney. Frequently likened to Pop’s first two Bowie collaborations, the record earned a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album. Teatime Dub Encounters, a four-track EP produced by Underworld—fellow contributors to the Trainspotting soundtrack—appeared in 2018. Iggy’s next solo endeavor moved further from rock: 2019’s Free centered on trumpet and atmospheric guitar, incorporating a musical setting of Dylan Thomas’s “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.”

Additional artifacts from earlier chapters soon emerged: 2019’s The Prime Movers Blues Band gathered unreleased live recordings of the Ann Arbor blues group he had drummed with in the mid-1960s, while 2020’s Live at Goose Lake, August 8, 1970 was drawn from a soundboard tape documenting the Stooges’ complete performance of Fun House at that festival. Pop remained active with European touring and collaborations across genres. Bill Laswell and the Opening Performance Orchestra enlisted him to narrate their 2020 musical adaptation of William S. Burroughs’s The Acid Lands. He contributed vocals to covers of Donovan’s “Sunshine Superman” and Timmy Thomas’s “Why Can’t We Live Together” on jazz organist Dr. Lonnie Smith’s 2021 album Breathe. The all-star tribute I’ll Be Your Mirror: A Tribute to the Velvet Underground and Nico appeared the same year; matched with guitarist Matt Sweeney, Pop delivered “European Son.” A poem he wrote after his parents’ deaths, “Mom and Dad,” offered a candid reflection on life and loss, which classical harpist Lavinia Meijer set to music for her 2022 album Are You Still Somewhere?, with Iggy serving as narrator. He supplied suitably theatrical vocals to the reworked “Kick Me” on Danny Elfman’s 2022 remix album Bigger. Messier. After discovering the work of Belgian composer and violinist Catherine Graindorge during a BBC Radio 6 appearance, Pop became an admirer and performed two of her pieces. Graindorge subsequently contacted him about a possible collaboration; he agreed immediately, resulting in four pieces for which she composed and performed the music while he wrote and recited the narration. These tracks formed the 2022 EP The Dictator on Glitterbeat Records.