WZBC recommends The Stooges By John Sobolewski

Published in the Tuesday, October 28, 2003 Edition of
By John Sobolewski
Heights Staff

It's been a couple millennia since Jesus came around and said, "the kingdom of God is at hand." Well, I don't know about that, but here in 2003 AD, the kingdom of lo-fi garage rock certainly is at hand.

The White Stripes, The Strokes, and some posers like The Vines have carved themselves a nice mainstream niche. Garage-punk revivalist records flow through snobby college radio stations (ZBC, for example) like milk and honey. Even people who don't have anything to do with punk rock are pretending they do: Christina Aguilera dresses like she got her wardrobe out of a dumpster, Pink rocks mohawks, etc.

But that leads me to the point of today's column: It's a history lesson. Twenty-first century neo-garage is all well and good, but ... let's skip back 30 years to the real thing.

Who was the real thing? The Stooges, friend, they were the real thing. Just like Chevys, Spielberg movies, and political dissent, garage rock was better in the '70s.

The Stooges were pure rock and roll. Their guitars screeched, distorted, and groaned behind lead singer Iggy Pop's death-rattle wailing; their mixing was harsh and abrasive. They did more drugs than Rush Limbaugh with a headache. They scared the hell out of critics, listeners, and concerned citizens alike. And Iggy used to gash his chest and bleed all over the stage on a regular basis. I mean sure, Elliot Smith did the same thing just the other day, but he didn't have an audience, and it's not like he'll be doing it anytime soon.

The Stooges made three great albums, saving their best for last: 1973's Raw Power. The album welded the thudding masculinity of Muddy Waters, the kinetic psychedelia of Jimi Hendrix, and the Freudian primitiveness of the Velvet Underground into pure, fiery noise, then poured whiskey all over it and injected it with heroin for good measure.

Raw Power is blistering from the get-go. The first cut, "Search and Destroy," blends Keith Moon-esque drumming and a hellishly manic guitar riff with harum-scarum lyrics ("I'm a street-walkin' cheetah with a heart full of napalm"), forging one of the most searing rock songs of all time.

The awesomely-named "Your Pretty Face is Going to Hell," offers an ecstatically unromantic take on sex and beauty. The ambiguously-named "Penetration," with its carnal vocals, searing guitar, and a few disturbingly innocent-sounding piano notes, leaves listeners feeling like they need a shower.

The title track, "Raw Power" lays the framework for bands from The Ramones down to The Hives. A single, hammering guitar chord rolls through the song like a bulldozer, while Iggy vents his nihilist, power-of-one philosophy. This stuff makes you want to get a Mohawk and spray-paint anarchy symbols on O'Neill plaza.

Hell, all the tracks are great. (Buy it, buy it on vinyl if you can, play it at a trillion decibels, kill your ears dead.) The second coming of garage rock ain't bad ... but the messiahs are still available for 13 bucks at any semi-decent record store. Go on rock believers, and worship.