FLASHBACK: The Stooges

Who do you think of when you think back to the 70s? ALICE COOPER, LED ZEPPELIN, THE RAMONES or the SEX PISTOLS maybe? All of these bands have been influential and helped carve the music industry into what it is today. But none of these people called DAVID BOWIE and DENNIS HOPPER into a psychiatric ward to deliver them drugs in 1975, oh no, that was IGGY POP.

IGGY POP is most famous for being the crazy front man of THE STOOGES, the band that is widely regarded as the instigators of punk rock, alternative rock, and some heavy metal. The band disbanded in 1974 after being together for seven years, but then reunited in 2003 and now have joined the line-up for the Byron Bay Bluesfest in 2013. In honour of the band’s trip to Australia, we shall take a look back at the good old, hyper days of THE STOOGES.

I WANNA BE YOUR DOG

‘I Wanna Be Your Dog’ has a strong guitar riff that will have you humming it for days because it is just so darn cool. This song is more of the alternative rock side of THE STOOGES and just oozes cool. Released in 1969, ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog’ was one of THE STOOGES most simple songs only featuring three chords and lyrics that apparently evoked a sense of ‘self-loathing’, which is pretty weird to me since I feel quite happy when I listen to this track. Since it’s release, JOAN JETT has covered “I Wanna Be Your Dog’, Rolling Stone named it number 438 on the list of the 500 Greatest Songs Of All Time and Pitchfork named it number 16 on the list of the 200 Greatest Songs of the 1960’s. Oh yeah.

LOOSE

Released in 1970 on the album Fun House, ‘Loose’ is a real punk rock tune that is one you can jump around like a manic to. Another simple guitar riff seems to work for THE STOOGES again by creating a great rock tune by again only using three chords. On 1970: The Complete Fun House Sessions, a seven CD boxset that chronicles all of the studio sessions for Fun House, ‘Loose’ has 22 takes with one of the having a voice in the background explaining that they could release an album full of all their ‘Loose’ recordings. Now I don’t know about you, but I’m glad the band chose to release this cut.

SEARCH AND DESTROY

Taken from their third studio release Raw Power, ‘Search and Destroy’ features IGGY POP singing the lyrics “I’m the world’s forgotten boy” relating to the Vietnam War, and IGGY POP has said that he even named the song after an article in Time Magazine that was about that particular war. The original track was mixed by IGGY’s close friend DAVID BOWIE, but was premastered in 2004 along with the rest of the Raw Power album to sound a lot more angry. The number of bands that have covered the song is far too vast to write on this one particular album, but I will tell you this: the original is always better.

NO FUN

Another track taken from THE STOOGES 1969 album, ‘No Fun’ uses crunchy guitars, and simple lyrics to mix together a great track that is one to last the ages. Being one of the band’s more composed tracks, ‘No Fun’ really does make you think that there is, well, no fun! It gives off a rich feeling of boredom with IGGY POP singing in quite a sensible tone, that is until the end of the song where he goes a little crazy. A cool guitar solo towards the end of the track highlights the bands rock edge and shows that THE STOOGES deserve all of the love they’ve received over the years.

Words by Lauren Payne

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