Iggy Pop seemed to return from the dead when he released “The Idiot” in March of 1977. His previous work with the Stooges felt like a lifetime ago, and very, very few people (other than perhaps David Bowie) could have imagined that there was any creative life left in him.

After metaphorically burning the Stooges to the ground in 1973, his subsequent self-imposed exile in a mental hospital seemed like the most logical thing he could have done. Pop wanted a second chance at building a career that could genuinely be sustained, and David Bowie (correctly) felt that he might be the best person on earth to help him realize his wish.

Together, they created an album entitled “The Idiot,” a crude allusion to the impression that most of the world had toward Pop. Artistically, the record was quite good but jarring in the way that it combined Pop’s loose observations with Bowie’s overtly artful production. Just as odd was to hear Pop as an observer of culture rather than as the flare gun intent on destroying it.

As good as it was, Pop didn’t sound like he was having much fun on “The Idiot”. It’s not hard to imagine that he may have been holding his cards close to his vest, unsure of whether he could trust the intentions of this odd British pop star. In six months’ time, he and Bowie teamed up again and corrected that perception quite handily.

Pop’s follow-up, “Lust for Life” sounds brighter than “The Idiot” because it allows some of the inspired lunacy of his earlier records to reemerge. It only takes seconds for the boundless energy of the opening drumbeat of the title track to establish the right frame of mind. The lyrics could be heard as sarcasm, but the ebullient energy of the song betrays such a perception.

This is massively triumphant, as if he’s celebrating a return to form, and possibly a whole new perspective on life itself. Pop’s genuine lust for living also emerges on tracks like “The Passenger”, where he cruises through a night “where everything is made for you and me, ‘cause it just belongs to you and me” and quite literally on “Sixteen” when he sings “I must be hungry ‘cause I go crazy over your leather boots”. “Success” is the dumb-as-a-fox capper portrayal of fun, lusty living, a loose call-and-response tune that allows Pop to ad-lib his way through a ridiculous array of images that are faithfully and consistently echoed back at him, even when it devolves into pure nonsense, with hilarious results. 

As on the previous album, Bowie and Pop share writing credits on almost everything here, but this time the mix is seamless. Bowie stays in the background, and lets his killer band (which would eventually become Tin Machine) do their work. Pop sounds sincere and confident, playing music that matches the smiling mug shot on the album cover. Out of darkness, obscurity and drug addiction, Iggy Pop suddenly returned as the new phoenix. How fortuitous that his rebirth would occur at the exact same moment that punk rock was looking over its shoulder for a relevant patron saint.

Featured Tracks:

Lust for Life

Sixteen

Some Weird Sin

The Passenger

Tonight

Success

Turn Blue

Neighborhood Threat

Fall in Love with Me

August 1977 - Billboard Charted #120