“Raw Power” by Iggy and The Stooges - album review

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TJR says

With the Stooges having officially broken up, Iggy was on the march for a new solo pathway – he thought he might find it London where he had a key artistic supporter in David Bowie, who helped set up a management deal for him. This was, to all intents and purposes, his first solo album but, as it turned out, the Stooges boys flew in to assist when Iggy felt the English session musicians were lacking some of that raw power, and the Stooges name was kept alive for another year. Things are very promising from the off on the ferociously exciting “Search And Destroy”: “I'm a street walking cheetah, with a heart full of napalm, I'm a runaway son of the nuclear A-bomb, I am a world's forgotten boy, the one who searches and destroys”. I also care for “Penetration” at the close of side 1 – it has some of that cool Stones swagger about it; I get the feeling someone’s been diggin’ on “Exile On Main Street”. They’ve never made a bad album but neither “Fun House” nor “Raw Power” were able to get anywhere near the phenomenal self-titled debut of ’69. What we have is a group slowly and surely moving from the punky avant-garde to the thrashy metal side of the fence. It’s acutely evidenced here by comparing the cool-thrills of side 1 to (what's getting towards) the wankery of side 2. Towards the end of “Death Trip” my central nervous system is secretly relieved that the end is nigh. Rawk Power mair-like.

The Jukebox Rebel
20–Jul–2007

Tracklist
A1 [03:29] 8.3.png Iggy and The Stooges - Search And Destroy (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Proto-Punk
A2 [03:33] 7.0.png Iggy and The Stooges - Gimme Danger (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Rock
A3 [04:54] 6.0.png Iggy and The Stooges - Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Rock
A4 [03:41] 7.2.png Iggy and The Stooges - Penetration (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Rock
B1 [04:16] 6.7.png Iggy and The Stooges - Raw Power (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Proto-Punk
B2 [04:53] 6.6.png Iggy and The Stooges - I Need Somebody (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
B3 [03:04] 5.9.png Iggy and The Stooges - Shake Appeal (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Proto-Punk
B4 [06:07] 5.7.png Iggy and The Stooges - Death Trip (James Osterberg, James Williamson) Rock

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