1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: 271. The Stooges – Raw Power (1973)

 

Here we are in 1973, a year in which the main news stories seem to be the final withdrawal of the USA from Vietnam, and the breaking of the Watergate scandal (Nixon remains President, however. For now...). Elsewhere, there are coups in various South American countries, and despite the end of manned Lunar missions, space exploration continues with the launch of Skylab, and Soviet probes to Mars. Overall though, a relatively quiet year (depending on where in the world you live!) 

And what a way to start the year, with some iconoclastic Iggy And The Stooges. This is an evolutionary step between The Stooges, and Iggy Pop as a solo artist; the band having at this point disbanded and then come back together (but with replacement guitarist James Williamson) to record this album. There’s some lengthy speculation and conflicting stories about the recording and mixing of the album. Supposedly Pop had recorded the studio takes on just two tracks  - instruments on one, vocals on the other, with David Bowie being called in to make something of the resultant takes. Much later, in 1997, Iggy Pop did his own remix as he felt that the Bowie mix was too thin. I’ve no idea which version I listened to. 
In a way, however, that fits the music, which is very garage/proto-punk. A more rough homemade feel to the recording makes it feel more real and visceral. It builds on the preceding Stooges sounds, but is harder edged, driven by punk guitar riffs. Most notable is on the track Shake Appeal that has a repetitive bass riff that underpins the track, with Iggy and Williamson building on top of it.  

The song titles tend towards the assaultive as well – Search And Destroy, Gimme Danger, Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell, Penetration, Raw Power, Death Trip. It didn’t grab me as much as Fun House did, perhaps partly due to the recording quality, perhaps because of when I listened to it.

There are roughly three occasions when I listen to these albums – on headphones at work, on the car stereo when driving, and on the earbuds when walking the dog. The latter is usually the best for really getting into an album. The mix quality is different in the car, and my attention is divided at work. This was an at-work one, and it really isn’t very good for that, especially compared to the previous album of light jazz from High Masekela. Also, although it is way ahead of its time in terms of the punk sound, there have been previous albums in this list (some of them by The Stooges) that have already done this kind of thing, and so the novelty is not as great as it could be.  

Is it good? Yes. Is it great? Not quite.