Iggy’s Bowie Albums Reviewed - The Idiot, Lust and Blah!
I am sitting in my friend Andrew’s, or Ziggy as he was known to everyone at school, bedroom looking through his record collection and pulled out The Stooges Raw Power. “Let’s play this, I’ve not heard it,” said a 14-year-old me with an Aladdin Sane haircut to my chum the school aficionado of cool which also meant all things Bowie in 1974…..” OK but it’s not very good”. Blasting out of his Wharfdale speakers and across the streets of Chiswick (London) came a piece of raw rock n roll completely at odds with the textured soundscapes of the era. He was right, it wasn’t very good……so I left this Bowie production alone for the next 30 years, its only redeeming feature was it had introduced me to Iggy Pop.
So jumping forward three years and the world had changed completely, a new generation had been introduced to The Stooges by Bowie and used it as the basis for a new London-based garage music called Punk Rock. I must admit I never bothered revisiting Raw Power even though it was being name-checked by The Pistols, Damned and The Clash. 77 was the year that punk really took off from being a trendy London cult to a national phenomenon of youth rebellion with protagonists cutting both their hair and their clothes. What most people miss is that this year was arguably Bowie’s most productive, issuing four albums that year, two of his own (Low and Heroes) and two with his friend Jimmy (The Idiot and Lust For Life).
As the UK turned it’s back on slick production to the stripped-back sounds of basic guitar and drums, David with the help of Brian Eno produced two experimental electronic albums influenced by the German movement spearheaded by the likes of Neu! and Kraftwerk. 1976’s Station to Station hinted at a new direction but when Low first came out it wrong-footed everyone with it’s ambient wanderings that we associated with Brian Eno. The companion album Heroes was less avant-garde but only just……but again Bowie had embraced something new, the synthesizer, which three years later would dominate the charts with Bowiesque acolytes androgynously staring out of our television sets on a Thursday night.
However, to me, the two best albums of that year were the two Iggy Pop LPs. The Idiot really carries on from Station to Station with a fusion of electro and soul, the music seems both experimental and catchy at the same time. Sister Midnight and Nightclubbing filled many an 80’s dance floor, Funtime is a classic rock song and Iggy’s China Girl is a far better version than Bowie’s smoother global hit. In many ways, this album has a better claim to being the launch pad for the Human League and Depeche Mode than Low or Heroes.
Then six months after The Idiot another Bowie-produced album arrives in Lust For Life. This time we have a much more traditional rock n roll disc. Another selection of Bowie-Pop written tracks which are much more commercial than anything on Low or Heroes. In the Autumn of 1977 I would pop around to my friend Jules house prior to going out for an evening, first thing we did was pop on Lust and tap our feet to the opening track. Like any great rock album, it does have darker moments that balance with the swingers…..Sweet 16 sits beautifully between Lust for Life and Some Weird Sin. The Passenger is clearly a pop classic but doesn’t feel stranded on a sea of mediocrity but sits like a breaking wave in a storm of perfection.
Looking back on this period Bowie is having a prolific era yet his famous sartorial elegance has deserted him. Look at photos from the time and our Dave has donned the finesse of a trendy supply school teacher, watch his appearance on Mac Bolan’s show Marc with his open shirt and turned-up jeans! I suppose he was searching for a look as he was getting older, he would have looked ridiculous dressed as a punk as much as he would have looked like a caricature of Ziggy had he been still appearing in outlandish stage attire from that iteration. He does reappear in earlier format in the Ashes to Ashes video, but generally our hero will be found in traditional suits for much of the rest of his life.
1986 saw Ig and Zig reconfigure for a final bow in Switzerland to make Pop’s best-selling disc Blah-Blah-Blah. Like all of James Osterberg’s output it still managed to fail in the mainstream arena never really getting the credit that it so richly deserved……not that this is a bad thing, mainstream success and artistic acclamation are rarely bedfellows. Bowie is a great example, best selling album is Let’s Dance a platter that I am guessing few “fans” ever play in the 21st Century. BBB’s opening track Real Wild Child hits you between the eyes, a great bit of rock n roll originally a song released in 1958 by Johnny O’Keefe. Shades is a classic bit of slow-paced Bowie as is Isolation with the masters signature sax giving the track that DB feel. Interestingly the album contains three excellent tracks written by Pop and Sex Pistol Steve Jones, Cry For Love was chosen as the first single and Fire Girl was also released as a stand-alone. This album is rich in textures and takes you on a journey that most classics do with the slow song’s tranquillity being emphasised between their more upbeat contemporaries.
I have to say that Bowie’s sojourn with Pop marks some of the best work that either did alone. I would go as far as to say Blah Blah Blah is the last truly great David Bowie LP and like any great offering the more you listen to it the better it becomes.
Going back to the start of this journey, a few years ago I was looking for a cover song for my band to do. I would rather do something that was familiar but not obvious, so my thoughts turned to Raw Power so I looked it up on Spotify……wow what a great album, yes it is edgy garage punk…..and contrary to my earlier understanding, it wasn’t produced by Bowie but mixed by him. Had Mr Oterberg had Mr Jones in the studio producing this material we could well have seen the Stooges gracing the stadiums of the world…….but then we might never have had the beauty of Iggy Pop’s luxurious solo career.
