Iggy Pop

Iggy Pop is an American punk singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. He is vocalist of influential protopunk band The Stooges, and he has become known for his outrageous and unpredictable stage antics.

Pop has recorded a number of well-known songs, including "Lust for Life", "Real Wild Child (Wild One)", "I Wanna Be Your Dog," "Candy", "China Girl", "Nightclubbing", "Search and Destroy", and "The Passenger".

In 1971, Iggy Pop and David Bowie met at Max's Kansas City, a nightclub and restaurant in New York City. A year later, Bowie helped Pop produce an album, Raw Power. In 1976, Bowie took Pop along as his companion on the Station to Station tour.

In 1977, Pop and Bowie wrote and produced The Idiot and Lust for Life, Pop's two most acclaimed albums as a solo artist. Among the songs Bowie and Pop wrote together were "China Girl", "Tonight", and "Sister Midnight", all of which Bowie performed on his own albums later on. Bowie also played keyboards in Pop's live performances, some of which are featured on the album TV Eye in 1978. In return, Pop contributed backing vocals on Bowie's Low.

In 1979, Pop released New Values in 1979 which included "Five Foot One" and "I'm Bored". The album was moderately successful in Australia and New Zealand. While visiting New Zealand, Iggy Pop recorded a music video for "I'm Bored".The album, Soldier, was released in 1980 and it was followed by Party a year later. Both were commercial failures, and Iggy Pop's drug habit persisted.

The 1982 album Zombie Birdhouse was not commercially successful, but, in 1983, David Bowie recorded a cover of the song "China Girl". On Tonight in 1984, Bowie recorded two more of their co-written songs, this time from the Lust for Life album, "Tonight" and "Neighborhood Threat". The support from Bowie enabled Pop to resolve problems and permitted him to take a three-year break during which he overcame his heroin addiction and took acting classes.

Additionally, Iggy Pop contributed the title song to the 1984 film Repo Man as well as an instrumental called "Repo Man Theme" that was played during the opening credits.

1986's New Wave-influenced Blah Blah Blah, was released and featured the single "Real Wild Child", a cover of "The Wild One". The single was a Top 10 hit in the UK and was successful around the world, especially in Australia, where for the last twenty years it has been used as the theme music for the ABC's late-night music video show Rage. Blah Blah Blah was Pop's highest-charting album in the U.S. since The Idiot in 1977, peaking at No. 75 on the Billboard Top 200 albums chart.

In 1987, Pop appeared on a mostly instrumental album, Neo Geo, by Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto. The music video for "Risky", written and directed by Meiert Avis, won the first ever MTV Breakthrough Video Award.

Pop's follow-up, Instinct, was released in 1988. Pop had more movie soundtrack inclusions in 1989, "Living on the Edge of the Night" in the Ridley Scott's thriller, Black Rain and "Love Transfusion" in Wes Craven's Shocker.

In 1990, Pop recorded Brick by Brick, with members of Guns N' Roses and The B-52's as guests, as well as backup vocals by many local Hollywood groups. The album was his first Gold-certified album in the U.S. (denoting sales of over 500,000 copies) and featured his first Top 40 U.S. hit, "Candy", a duet with B-52's singer Kate Pierson.

Also in 1990, Pop starred in the controversial opera The Manson Family by composer John Moran, released on Point Music/Phillip Classics, where he sang the role of prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi. That year he was also contributed to the Red Hot Organization's AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Blue project, singing a version of "Well Did You Evah!" in a duet with Deborah Harry.

In 1991, Pop and Kirst contributed the song "Why Was I Born (Freddy's Dead)" to the soundtrack of the film Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare.

In 1992, he collaborated with Goran Bregovic' on the soundtrack for the movie Arizona Dream by Emir Kusturica. Also in 1992, he collaborated with the New York City band White Zombie. He recorded spoken word vocals on the intro and outro of the song "Black Sunshine.

In 1993, Pop released American Caesar, including two successful singles, "Wild America" and "Beside You". The following year Pop contributed to Buckethead's album Giant Robot, including the songs "Buckethead's Toy Store" and "Post Office Buddy". He appears also on the Les Rita Mitsouko album Système D where he sings the duet "My Love is Bad" with Catherine Ringer.

In 1996, Pop again found mainstream fame when his 1977 song "Lust for Life" was featured in the film Trainspotting. A new video was recorded for the song, with clips from the film and studio footage of Iggy dancing with one of its stars, Ewen Bremner.

In 1996, Pop released Naughty Little Doggie and the single "I Wanna Live". In 1997, he remixed Raw Power to give it a rougher, more hard-edged sound. Pop. He co-produced his 1999 album Avenue B with Don Was, releasing the single "Corruption". Pop produced 2001's Beat 'Em Up releasing the single "Football" featuring Trolls alumni Whitey Kirst and brother Alex.

Pop's 2003 album Skull Ring featured collaborators Sum 41, Green Day, Peaches, and The Trolls, as well as Ron and Scott Asheton, reuniting the three surviving founding members of The Stooges for the first time since 1974. Pop made a guest appearance on Peaches's song Kick It as well as the video.

Iggy Pop's last solo album, Préliminaires, was released in June 2009. In March 2010, the Stooges and Iggy Pop were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.