On his last solo album in 2016, Iggy Pop got closest to his cartoon image as punk pioneer, best known shirtless and howling over primitive riffs in the early Seventies. Post Pop Depression, recorded with members of a younger generation of raw rockers — Queens of the Stone Age and Arctic Monkeys — earned him his highest chart places ever. However, such belated success has sent the 72-year-old sprinting somewhere else entirely. This 18th release is certainly a strange one.
“I wanna be free,” he intones on the atmospheric intro, which in this case means recording loose-limbed mood pieces with jazz trumpeter Leron Thomas and composer Sarah Lipstate, who works with guitar soundscapes. The steady chug of Loves Missing builds to a menacing cacophony — a fantastic opening, followed by the itchy hi-hats and meandering horns of Sonali, which sounds like modern day Radiohead and is impressive in a different way.
After that it’s on to James Bond — not much more than a bassline and a novelty lyric — and Dirty Sanchez, which mixes mariachi sounds and lyrics about porn. The contemplative atmosphere of much of the album lurches away when Pop yelps, “You desensitised sluts, always playing with your butts!”
In the second half, he shifts between a wobbly croon and not singing at all. On We Are The People and Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, he speaks in a low, cavernous voice while the music is painted on in abstract brushstrokes. It’s lovely twilight stuff, a world away from punk — and why not?
