Iggy and the Stooges
California Bleeding (Bomp!)
by Nik Rainey
And the back-catalogue flood waters continue to rise… With most of the major ’50s/’60s reish backlog depleted and the most important ’70s/’80s catalogue refurbishments being taken care of by master re-masterers Rykodisc (classy) and Rhino (exhaustive/eccentric), it seems that every remaining scrap of junkstore vinyl marginalia is being given a second life on a medium that often serves only to make it sound worse than it originally did, an approach that uncovers a lot of stuff that should have remained interred but also makes some invaluable historical artifacts (especially ’60s garage-punk and ’70s we-can’t-afford-a-fuckin’-garage-punk) available at popular prices.
One of the best labels in this regard is Bomp!, which grew out of the seminal ‘zine of the same name started by avid collector/mojo navigator Greg Shaw in the early ’70s, and continues to make available much of the best stuff to earn the name “punk,” and it behooves me to give shout-outs to their two best reissue projects. One, the Pebbles series of pre-Pepper excavations, has been given ample ink in these pages previously, but I just can’t get enough of that fuzzed-out, sneery stuff. Good thing, too, ’cause between this series and a couple of offshoots, there’s over sixty volumes of phabulous phreaky obscurities from every disgruntled corner of the Great Society. If such variety overwhelms you, grab The Essential Pebbles Collection – Volume One, a bargain-priced two-disc collection skimming the most exquisitely curdled cream of the circa-’66 crop. Disc one excerpts the first ten volumes of the series (except for the comparatively weak surf sampler), while disc two compiles never-before-collected rarities (some so obscure that even the artists’ names are unknown!). Sound quality varies, but who cares when you can get a good thumbnail sketch of mid-’60s teen sexual politics just by reading the song titles consecutively: “I’m In Love.” “I’ve Gotta Go.” “I Want You To Know” “I Want You.” “I Just Don’t Know.” (“Fed Up”) “I’ve Had It.” “It’s Your Fault.” “Some Other Guy.” “Go Go Girl.”
The second is The Iguana Chronicles, really just the new christening of a project that dates back to the “I’m Sick of You!” single back in ’77 – high-quality official issues of James Williamson-era Stooges material and early pre-habbed solo Iggy, arguably a creative peak for the Pop (or at least the most self-destructive segment of his career, which may mean the same thing). Last year’s Year of the Iguana summed up that period as succinctly as possible, and is highly recommended, both to completist freaks and those who think that “Search and Destroy” was written for that Nike ad. California Bleeding, on the other hand, is designed with the diehard in mind. Not that it’s an inferior product in any way – these newly-unearthed live takes from the declining days of Stoogedelia are as lovingly packaged as you could ask for, with rare photos, two different essays on Iggy’s invasions of California, and articulate interview swatches woven into the fabric of the disc, and Iggy’s ferocious, untamed stage presence bleeds through the thin, distant (but distortion-free) recording quality. But do you really need yet another version of “Open Up and Bleed, ” “Head On,” or “She Creatures of the Hollywood Hills?” Well…yes. You do. Proceed.
Moving on a few years and a hemisphere over to the most Stooge-friendly island in the world, we find one of Australia’s seminal punk bands, so seminal they still looked like hippies. In 1977, The Saints recorded the surprise hit single “(I’m) Stranded,” a song that would have been a great mainstream pop number if it hadn’t been laid down on equipment that consisted of tin cans, rubber bands and sheep dip, like most Aussie records of the time. The resulting ruckus positioned them at the vanguard of the new punk explosion, even though the album that followed, named for the single, mined a fairly-pure vein of derived sound, topped off by an Elvis cover (“Kissin’ Cousins”) that’s silly but not altogether irreverent. Their second album, Eternally Yours, is both punkier in its cynicism (“Know Your Product,” “This Perfect Day”) and slicker in its approach, using full horn sections and more ambitious arrangements to underscore the dragstrip blare of the guitars and the refined bawl of Chris Bailey. As a result, it’s even better, a vital extrapolation of the snotty essence of Stones-style rock at a time when that band was too busy getting busted and inventing the two-headed rock/disco monster to notice. (Bonus tracks on the Amsterdamned reissues include a nervy bash at Ike and Tina’s bombasterpiece, “River Deep Mountain High.”) And hell, while you’re at it, check out the new album by the latest manifestation of the Saints, Howling (also on Amsterdamned) – only Bailey remains from the original lineup and the modernized sound is a far cry from the enlightened primitivism of the Ed Kuepper days, but it comes a damn sight closer than some of the neutered pabulum-platters Bailey churned out in the ’80s under their name.
