The Stooges (Deluxe Edition)

iTunes Review

Iggy Pop and the Stooges barely had an album’s worth of material when they recorded their debut album. But the Detroit quartet’s originality and brilliance was there from the beginning. “1969,” “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and “No Fun” were tight, angry bursts of primal rock n’ roll delivered in the starkest tones, much at odds with the psychedelic flourishes and derivative blues-rock of the era. There was no such thing as ‘punk rock’ back then, but the group was inadvertently sketching the blueprint. The Velvet Underground’s former bassist-violist John Cale produced the album and accentuated the group’s minimalism (though, curiously, his mixes for the record, included now as bonus material, were considered too ‘arty’ for mass consumption). It’s Cale you hear banging the single piano note throughout “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and his screeching viola that leads the extended freak-out of “We Will Fall.” Toss in “Real Cool Time,” “Not Right” and “Little Doll,” three more brilliantly succinct tunes written the night before the additional recording sessions the record label said were necessary to finish off the album, and you’ve got one of rock n’ roll history’s most deservedly legendary debut albums. The deluxe edition’s bonus material is revelatory, offering John Cale’s original mixes, alternate vocals tracks of “1969,” “Dog” and “Not Right,” as well as the uncut versions of “Ann” and “No Fun.” Essential.