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Gimme Danger: The Story of Iggy Pop
A profile of James Jewel Osterburg--also known as Iggy Stooge, Iggy Pop, and the Godfather of Punk--offers a look into the life of the complex musician and artist.
- GenresMusicBiographyNonfiction
328 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2004
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55 people want to read
About the author
Joe Ambrose
31 books7 followersJoe Ambrose works as a writer, filmmaker, and DJ. As a member of experimental hip hop group Islamic Diggers, he as performed live with Lydia Lunch, Anita Pallenberg, Richard Hell, and Howard Marks. He is the author of seven previous books including two novels - Too Much Too Soon and Serious Time - praised by The Guardian as being "unputdownable." His non-fiction includes Gimme Danger: The Iggy Pop Story, Moshpit Culture, and, with Frank Rynne, Hashishin. He co-produced with Rynne the 2CD 10% File Under Burroughs featuring tracks from William Burroughs, Brion Gysin, John Cale, Marianne Faithful
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August 1, 2019My top 5 rock albums (chronologically) are:
Iggy & the Stooges: Raw Power
AC/DC: Powerage
Joy Division: Closer
Jesus & Mary Chain: Barbed Wire Kisses
Slint: Spiderland
I got into Iggy & the Stooges late, and it’s lucky I did cos as a teenager I didn’t need more of that ‘Don’t ya try to tell me what to do’ attitude than I already had listening to The Cure and Ziggy Stardust. In Australia in the 80s Iggy was god. Sydney Stooges fans Radio Birdman (whose Tek, Younger and Gilbert played with Ron Asheton and Dennis ‘Machine Gun’ Thompson in the shortlived New Race) headed the cult. To me they were macho, unsubtle, put me off their influences. Meantime all-night music program Rage played a cut-up of ‘Real Wild Child’ every few songs for years. One night in ’92/93 ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ came on the video-wall at Colonnades Tavern in Noarlunga (my shoegaze band Movement played some Battle of the Bands there, worst gig ever) and I thought ‘What is happening?' Grime’d broke out of indie radio. In a few months our Anglophile enclave was shook to the core. Every new band in town was grunge (not so different to before our Anglo scene, if Exploding White Mice were any indicator). I coulda borne a grudge against Iggy, but by then I was writing novels and falling in love. I sold my amp, went to Tasmania, broke up, went to Melbourne, went dancing. And when I got into guitars again I went back in time: blues, soul, old rock ’n’ roll, bands I’d missed from the 80s. And the Stooges.
I’m writing this now cos I just listened to Raw Power and it was good. Time was I would’ve gotten all juiced up and looking for kicks after that shot of adrenalin, but I was susceptible in those days and kicks were never far from my mind, though I never seemed to find them in sleepy Melbourne town. Truth is I don’t listen to much music these days, especially rock, especially loud. I might put on some blast-from-the-past in the car (Fats Domino, James Carr), or some random album bequeathed me by friends (mostly arty things I’d never have gotten myself: Fuck Buttons, John Zorn). Or I’ll knuckle down to some journal-writing outside a cafe, with the i-Pod playing Edgar Froese or Aphex Twin to cut the customer noise, or groove around the loungeroom to J Dilla or Stephan Bodzin. Anything I love I’ve listened to death by now, except Raw Power. I’ve been missing Raw Power for years, ever since I got sick of lugging my tapes and CDs around and swapped to MP3s. Raw Power, the Iggy remix, copied to tape, sat in storage for 5+ years. And it’s all the better for it.
Raw Power – a key influence (they say) on British punk. Recorded in London in 1973 after Iggy had signed to Bowie’s manager Tony Defries’ Main Man management company and Defries had rejected the (also brilliant) demos the band had done in Detroit after Funhouse (‘I Got a Right’, ‘Gimme Some Skin’, etc; released in various bootleg guises over the years, these 5 or 6 songs were reportedly one of the key influences on the Pixies). Produced by David Bowie with the band – at first there were rumours Bowie had deliberately sabotaged the project, fearing the Stooges’ competition, as if the British wunderkind couldn’t possibly have messed up! But rock production is hard, all the moreso the broader the band’s dynamic range. It’s why a producer can make or break a band. And it’s why Bowie (whose other main production of the time – Lou Reed’s Transformer – sounds lame on the rocking tracks) broke this band. Raw Power is flawed, stillborn. It waited twenty years for a remaster and when Iggy’s mix came out most people (band included) wished for the Bowie mix back. I heard the Iggy mix first and I love it, but it’s nasty. Classic rock production it ain’t, but the guitars are massive! When that second layer of chords kicks in in ‘Search and Destroy’ it just about lifts off.
I’m ashamed to say it, but if it weren’t for the film Velvet Goldmine (a historically inaccurate, bitchy faux bio-pic of Bowie featuring Ewan McGregor as Iggy/Lou/Cobain hybrid) I’d probably have kept thinking the first half of Funhouse was the Stooges at their finest. But McGregor belting ‘Can you feel it?’ over a Sonic Youth and Ron Asheton-based supergroup was enough: this was music I had to hear! My older DJ flatmate’d written it off, copied the first two albums for me and acted like that was it, lent me a tape of Iggy’s Kill City (recorded with Raw Power guitarist James Williamson while Iggy was in and out of mental hospital) and that’d struck me indifferently enough to make me think maybe he was right. And to this day Raw Power seems the poorer brother to Funhouse, which comes with its own box-set, multiple outtakes and all, and a blurb from Jack White (bless him) saying it’s the quintessential American rock record. Don’t get me wrong, Funhouse rocks – the production’s better, the band’s tighter – but Raw Power has the songs, and the fire, and that feel of hands crossing the Atlantic – Limeys and Yanks cooperating for a higher purpose – that makes the Stones’ recordings at Muscle Shoals, for eg, so brilliant. And in fact, it’s when I feel like a more intense shot of the Stones that I reach for Raw Power. Why is Sticky Fingers not on my Top 5? (Or Ziggy Stardust, for that matter?) It’s dated. Raw Power – that could be now. It’s got almost... a pop sensibility! Verses, choruses, there may even be a pre-chorus or two! It’s a proto-Nevermind. (Kurt, it transpired once his journals were made public, thought very highly of it). And when it grooves it’s like nothing else. No longer Hendrix-obsessive or chained to the riff, the Stooges go to outer space on this one, without a saxophone in sight.
As for the book, I read it in 2006, as my Iggy obsession was tailing off. It was shitty, and I’d read most of it elsewhere before, but I bought it new for some ridiculous amount of money, I guess cos it was called ‘Gimme Danger’ (a key song on Raw Power). As if, cos the writer had accurately pinpointed the peak of Iggy’s career, he’d know something about writing. Like Bowie, Iggy, these days, is served by a lot of biographers, none of which seems to take the task quite seriously. That said, the early days of the Stooges are always gonna be interesting, and it’s fascinating to get a taste (however insipid) of late-60s Detroit intelligentsia. To me, most of Iggy’s career since Berlin has been take-or-leave it. New Values (produced by James Williamson, with the shit-hot Scott Thurston on guitar) was good. There’ve been a few good songs since. But aside from maybe The Idiot no Iggy album excites me like the Stooges. With Raw Power they invented something bulletproof. Something that, no matter how few people actually listen to it, will inspire musicians for years to come. Primal Scream, at average age 40, on the best album of their career, Xtrmntr, did a ditty called ‘Accelerator’ that was Raw Power for the computer age. Alec Empire copped the vocal sound on ‘The Ride’ (surely a ‘Passenger’ reference) from Intelligence and Sacrifice. Since then, I guess, the sound’s gone underground. But it’ll be back. Royal Trux, they say, tried to cover the entirety of Exile on Main Street. Far better someone try Raw Power. I’d do it but I fear my old heart might not be up to it. Love in the middle of a fire-fight. Now if I could just find my ‘I Got a Right’ tape...
Iggy & the Stooges: Raw Power
AC/DC: Powerage
Joy Division: Closer
Jesus & Mary Chain: Barbed Wire Kisses
Slint: Spiderland
I got into Iggy & the Stooges late, and it’s lucky I did cos as a teenager I didn’t need more of that ‘Don’t ya try to tell me what to do’ attitude than I already had listening to The Cure and Ziggy Stardust. In Australia in the 80s Iggy was god. Sydney Stooges fans Radio Birdman (whose Tek, Younger and Gilbert played with Ron Asheton and Dennis ‘Machine Gun’ Thompson in the shortlived New Race) headed the cult. To me they were macho, unsubtle, put me off their influences. Meantime all-night music program Rage played a cut-up of ‘Real Wild Child’ every few songs for years. One night in ’92/93 ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ came on the video-wall at Colonnades Tavern in Noarlunga (my shoegaze band Movement played some Battle of the Bands there, worst gig ever) and I thought ‘What is happening?' Grime’d broke out of indie radio. In a few months our Anglophile enclave was shook to the core. Every new band in town was grunge (not so different to before our Anglo scene, if Exploding White Mice were any indicator). I coulda borne a grudge against Iggy, but by then I was writing novels and falling in love. I sold my amp, went to Tasmania, broke up, went to Melbourne, went dancing. And when I got into guitars again I went back in time: blues, soul, old rock ’n’ roll, bands I’d missed from the 80s. And the Stooges.
I’m writing this now cos I just listened to Raw Power and it was good. Time was I would’ve gotten all juiced up and looking for kicks after that shot of adrenalin, but I was susceptible in those days and kicks were never far from my mind, though I never seemed to find them in sleepy Melbourne town. Truth is I don’t listen to much music these days, especially rock, especially loud. I might put on some blast-from-the-past in the car (Fats Domino, James Carr), or some random album bequeathed me by friends (mostly arty things I’d never have gotten myself: Fuck Buttons, John Zorn). Or I’ll knuckle down to some journal-writing outside a cafe, with the i-Pod playing Edgar Froese or Aphex Twin to cut the customer noise, or groove around the loungeroom to J Dilla or Stephan Bodzin. Anything I love I’ve listened to death by now, except Raw Power. I’ve been missing Raw Power for years, ever since I got sick of lugging my tapes and CDs around and swapped to MP3s. Raw Power, the Iggy remix, copied to tape, sat in storage for 5+ years. And it’s all the better for it.
Raw Power – a key influence (they say) on British punk. Recorded in London in 1973 after Iggy had signed to Bowie’s manager Tony Defries’ Main Man management company and Defries had rejected the (also brilliant) demos the band had done in Detroit after Funhouse (‘I Got a Right’, ‘Gimme Some Skin’, etc; released in various bootleg guises over the years, these 5 or 6 songs were reportedly one of the key influences on the Pixies). Produced by David Bowie with the band – at first there were rumours Bowie had deliberately sabotaged the project, fearing the Stooges’ competition, as if the British wunderkind couldn’t possibly have messed up! But rock production is hard, all the moreso the broader the band’s dynamic range. It’s why a producer can make or break a band. And it’s why Bowie (whose other main production of the time – Lou Reed’s Transformer – sounds lame on the rocking tracks) broke this band. Raw Power is flawed, stillborn. It waited twenty years for a remaster and when Iggy’s mix came out most people (band included) wished for the Bowie mix back. I heard the Iggy mix first and I love it, but it’s nasty. Classic rock production it ain’t, but the guitars are massive! When that second layer of chords kicks in in ‘Search and Destroy’ it just about lifts off.
I’m ashamed to say it, but if it weren’t for the film Velvet Goldmine (a historically inaccurate, bitchy faux bio-pic of Bowie featuring Ewan McGregor as Iggy/Lou/Cobain hybrid) I’d probably have kept thinking the first half of Funhouse was the Stooges at their finest. But McGregor belting ‘Can you feel it?’ over a Sonic Youth and Ron Asheton-based supergroup was enough: this was music I had to hear! My older DJ flatmate’d written it off, copied the first two albums for me and acted like that was it, lent me a tape of Iggy’s Kill City (recorded with Raw Power guitarist James Williamson while Iggy was in and out of mental hospital) and that’d struck me indifferently enough to make me think maybe he was right. And to this day Raw Power seems the poorer brother to Funhouse, which comes with its own box-set, multiple outtakes and all, and a blurb from Jack White (bless him) saying it’s the quintessential American rock record. Don’t get me wrong, Funhouse rocks – the production’s better, the band’s tighter – but Raw Power has the songs, and the fire, and that feel of hands crossing the Atlantic – Limeys and Yanks cooperating for a higher purpose – that makes the Stones’ recordings at Muscle Shoals, for eg, so brilliant. And in fact, it’s when I feel like a more intense shot of the Stones that I reach for Raw Power. Why is Sticky Fingers not on my Top 5? (Or Ziggy Stardust, for that matter?) It’s dated. Raw Power – that could be now. It’s got almost... a pop sensibility! Verses, choruses, there may even be a pre-chorus or two! It’s a proto-Nevermind. (Kurt, it transpired once his journals were made public, thought very highly of it). And when it grooves it’s like nothing else. No longer Hendrix-obsessive or chained to the riff, the Stooges go to outer space on this one, without a saxophone in sight.
As for the book, I read it in 2006, as my Iggy obsession was tailing off. It was shitty, and I’d read most of it elsewhere before, but I bought it new for some ridiculous amount of money, I guess cos it was called ‘Gimme Danger’ (a key song on Raw Power). As if, cos the writer had accurately pinpointed the peak of Iggy’s career, he’d know something about writing. Like Bowie, Iggy, these days, is served by a lot of biographers, none of which seems to take the task quite seriously. That said, the early days of the Stooges are always gonna be interesting, and it’s fascinating to get a taste (however insipid) of late-60s Detroit intelligentsia. To me, most of Iggy’s career since Berlin has been take-or-leave it. New Values (produced by James Williamson, with the shit-hot Scott Thurston on guitar) was good. There’ve been a few good songs since. But aside from maybe The Idiot no Iggy album excites me like the Stooges. With Raw Power they invented something bulletproof. Something that, no matter how few people actually listen to it, will inspire musicians for years to come. Primal Scream, at average age 40, on the best album of their career, Xtrmntr, did a ditty called ‘Accelerator’ that was Raw Power for the computer age. Alec Empire copped the vocal sound on ‘The Ride’ (surely a ‘Passenger’ reference) from Intelligence and Sacrifice. Since then, I guess, the sound’s gone underground. But it’ll be back. Royal Trux, they say, tried to cover the entirety of Exile on Main Street. Far better someone try Raw Power. I’d do it but I fear my old heart might not be up to it. Love in the middle of a fire-fight. Now if I could just find my ‘I Got a Right’ tape...
August 22, 2020
There was a time in my life when I would have devoured a 300-page rock biography in the space of a weekend. Instead, this one took me three and a half months.
Mind you, it's an excellent book. There is a ton of information about Iggy Pop that I didn't know ... and I'm a long-time fan. Despite that fandom, though, I found that I could only take Iggy's antics in small doses. Thus, I would go a long time in between reading chapters and pick up something a little less ... manic.
The book is beautifully researched, replete with interviews, discographies, and more. But it is a *lot* to take, even for a fan. Consider yourself warned. It's worth every one of the five stars, but it's kind of exhausting.
Mind you, it's an excellent book. There is a ton of information about Iggy Pop that I didn't know ... and I'm a long-time fan. Despite that fandom, though, I found that I could only take Iggy's antics in small doses. Thus, I would go a long time in between reading chapters and pick up something a little less ... manic.
The book is beautifully researched, replete with interviews, discographies, and more. But it is a *lot* to take, even for a fan. Consider yourself warned. It's worth every one of the five stars, but it's kind of exhausting.
February 9, 2022
I had the pleasure to meet the man a couple of times and when you know his Achilles heel you would get it more! But personally I loved it, probably a bit biased! By the way he didn’t write it himself!
April 1, 2022
Some humorous and insightful moments, particularly the Berlin era, yet written with an acid negativity which robs it of a non-biased account of Iggy’s career. Hard to follow at times as the point of certain pages went nowhere and information is related across different chapters by rote as if the writer had forgotten he’d used the same researched paragraph earlier in the book about a different moment in Iggy’s life. A bit sloppy in all honesty and some factual elements are incorrect. Generally an entertaining read but not one I’d make an effort to recommend to anyone.
December 12, 2022
It is great subject matter, and an interesting character study. The book is mainly a series of quotes and extracts from other biographies, articles and interviews. The authorial voice is negative, dismissive, homophobic and often makes factual errors.
September 1, 2019
Well written, well rounded and well researched
November 5, 2022
Interesting up until about the first half of the book and thereafter it starts to really fade away.
March 25, 2024
Not bad but most of the material and quotes are lifted from other sources.
January 28, 2016
Bought this book years ago, read the first six chapters and put it back on the shelf until I decided I wanted to try and go through my half-read books.
Very thorough re-telling of Pop's life and career up until the release of 2003's 'Skull Ring', using a lot of long quotes from people who were there, generally going 'album by album'.
Generally found this interesting although I think this is probably the first biography I've read where the author asserts their own opinion so forcefully - often critical, sometimes sarcastic, not only when discussing Pop's latter career moves, but also the likes of The Cult's Ian Astbury, Kurt Cobain, David Bowie, Peaches and many others don't escape the writer's scorn in one form or another throughout this, comments which I felt were completely unnecessary to the story being told. Who cares if the author didn't understand why Iggy chose to duet with Peaches on a few tracks on the 'Skull Ring' album (the accusation being that any duets on that album were purely done for cashing in on the popularity of others)? At one point, a comment Iggy himself is quoted as saying during an interview is even labelled as 'incorrect'?!
I also found it a little strange that aspects of Iggy's personal life such as marriages etc. were written about in very much a secondary nature - for example we aren't told he fathered a child until around 7-8 years after his son's birth! Yet other topics including drug binges and the clientele of NYC clubs are repeated several times and could have done with a bit of editing.
The writer is very unimpressed with Iggy's contribution to film soundtracks in the 80's ('Crocodile Dundee II' gets it's fair share of barbed comments) but personally I wouldn't have minded reading a little bit more of how Iggy became involved in those projects, rather than just having them dismissed as trash or ignored because the author thought Iggy had sold out.
An author who doesn't fawn over their subject is good when it comes to biographies, but I thought this book went a little too much the other way, when I would have preferred to read a slightly less critical, matter of fact account of Iggy Pop's life and work.
Very thorough re-telling of Pop's life and career up until the release of 2003's 'Skull Ring', using a lot of long quotes from people who were there, generally going 'album by album'.
Generally found this interesting although I think this is probably the first biography I've read where the author asserts their own opinion so forcefully - often critical, sometimes sarcastic, not only when discussing Pop's latter career moves, but also the likes of The Cult's Ian Astbury, Kurt Cobain, David Bowie, Peaches and many others don't escape the writer's scorn in one form or another throughout this, comments which I felt were completely unnecessary to the story being told. Who cares if the author didn't understand why Iggy chose to duet with Peaches on a few tracks on the 'Skull Ring' album (the accusation being that any duets on that album were purely done for cashing in on the popularity of others)? At one point, a comment Iggy himself is quoted as saying during an interview is even labelled as 'incorrect'?!
I also found it a little strange that aspects of Iggy's personal life such as marriages etc. were written about in very much a secondary nature - for example we aren't told he fathered a child until around 7-8 years after his son's birth! Yet other topics including drug binges and the clientele of NYC clubs are repeated several times and could have done with a bit of editing.
The writer is very unimpressed with Iggy's contribution to film soundtracks in the 80's ('Crocodile Dundee II' gets it's fair share of barbed comments) but personally I wouldn't have minded reading a little bit more of how Iggy became involved in those projects, rather than just having them dismissed as trash or ignored because the author thought Iggy had sold out.
An author who doesn't fawn over their subject is good when it comes to biographies, but I thought this book went a little too much the other way, when I would have preferred to read a slightly less critical, matter of fact account of Iggy Pop's life and work.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 23, 2016
An interesting story about a one of a kind rock n roll animal was ruined for me somewhat by a writer who seemed to have an agenda against his subject and was determined to cast Iggy as a dopey, poser asshole. I've no doubt Iggy probably was an asshole at times, in fact I think it's a prerequisite to being a success in the entertainment industry, but his work and legacy proves he was worth more than this (admittedly well researched) hatchet job. This book is also littered with other bizarre and wrong headed opinions from the author "Cream, the worst rock band of all time"? "Kurt Cobain incapable of writing a good rock song"? which make me think the writer is maybe an unaccomplished musician with a petty score to settle. Disappointing, but hasn't put me of looking into several of the other Pop biographies out there.
January 30, 2008
Realistic and very thorough, however once you get to know Iggy you realize that he is human and it busts him down a few rungs. The stuff with Bowie it pretty cool too. It's probably better to just listen to the records and leave it a mystery. Ambrose isn't a star struck fan so he doesn't pander to Iggy and treat him like a god.
If you like the Iggy and the Stooges its worth the read.
If you like the Iggy and the Stooges its worth the read.
April 24, 2008
To follow the cast of characters through this pop culture world is a riot.... although it remains unfinished, so there maybe some attention span issues with this one.
November 15, 2012
Mehh, I would prefer to hear his story in his own words and keep the authors personal opinions out of it. It was ok.
Read
August 6, 2011I realy enjoyed this. Funny, irreverent, lots of information and quotes from people who were there. Well worth a read for anyone interested in the roots of punk. 26.7.09
August 14, 2011
I would like to read more of Iggy's take on his own life. This is great, but I keep hearing how Iggy would tell it himself...in song, even.
August 25, 2013
Great detail on total wild man of rock
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews