'Every Loser' by Iggy Pop
Punk-rock progenitor Iggy Pop has aged more than a half-century since the Stooges, the Michigan-based quartet he fronted, released their self-titled debut in 1969. On Every Loser, he’s sought youth in the 32-year-old form of Andrew Watt, who’s collaborated with pop stars like Camila Cabello as well as rock stars like Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder.
Watt is this album’s producer and executive producer, as well as a multi-instrumentalist and co-writer on every track. He’s even listed as president and CEO of Gold Tooth, the imprint helping to release the album.
Therefore, he can claim responsibility for the layers of modern polish sprayed over Iggy’s latest regression to stone-simple chords, primitive rhythms, and sneeringly basic rhymes tossed out like unsold hamburgers at the end of a fast-food joint’s night shift.
Those rhymes are more edible, though—“Got a dick and two balls/That’s more than you all” are the first words on Every Loser—and Iggy delivers them with as much dark verve as he did on previous slick regressions like 1986’s Blah-Blah-Blah and 2003’s Skull Ring.
Watt also assembles an impressive band, the Losers, with Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith and Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan. Former Peppers guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, Pearl Jam guitarist Stone Gossard, and late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins are among the auxiliary Losers who usefully flex their muscles alongside Iggy.
Craggily contemplating his Miami home in the mellowly flinty “New Atlantis,” rolling through Stones-style ennui in “Morning Show,” and doing the grunge boogie in “All the Way Down,” Iggy accesses his younger, snottier self and adds gray shades of the thoughtful maturity he showed more openly on 2019’s Free.
Iggy Pop imbues Every Loser with an earned take-it-or-leave-it mentality. Andrew Watt hasn’t attempted to earn such a mentality yet, but here at least he does no harm to his elder’s legacy or reputation.
|
|
