I just got Iggy Pop's Skull Ring album tonight (via an Amazon new/used vendor ... it ended up under $5 with shipping!), and this just plain fucking ROCKS ... I'd been so sick of picking up stuff that disappointed the hell out of me, and this one is pretty nearly a classic. About 1/3 of the album is recorded with his touring band, The Trolls, about 1/3 with a pre-reunion dry run with the Asheton brothers of The Stooges, and about 1/3 with Green Day, Sum 41, and Peaches (whoever she is). It is amazing to hear Iggy sounding this focused ... rocking like it was 1973 ... and the dude is 10 years older than me at 60!
The best tunes are, frankly, with The Stooges ... although the cuts with The Trolls aren't far behind. This is not to say that the songs with Green Day and Sum 41 are bad but they're just not Iggy. I've been a long-term fan (heck, I have a mint copy of the clear blue vinyl pressing of Kill City around here somewhere!), and this is the first thing in a long time which has brought back the rocking that was there in the "classics", be they the old Stooges stuff or "the Bowie albums".
If you have a chance to grab this, do so ... and then tell me that cuts like Little Electric Chair, Skull Ring, Loser or Dead Rock Star don't make you wanna crawl through broken glass in skin-tight silver leather pants!
