{"id":3364,"date":"2014-09-13T12:00:56","date_gmt":"2014-09-13T12:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.eoisabi.org\/?p=3364"},"modified":"2025-12-28T17:30:20","modified_gmt":"2025-12-28T17:30:20","slug":"iggy-pop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/?p=3364","title":{"rendered":"Iggy Pop + Lou Reed"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00abI had just learned to smoke (cigarettes and grass), and I was excited about it. I had always had asthma and couldn’t smoke. One day I was walking down the street and someone blew a puff in my face from a passing cigarette on a fall day, which is always the worst season. So its was, uh,\u00a0\u00abSmoke – i’m gonna fall down any second,\u00bb<\/em>\u00a0and nothing happened. So I thought, AH HA! And immediately I became a two pack a day Camel smoker, which was really bad for me and causes me a touch of asthma even today.\u00bb<\/p>\n

\"iggy-pop\"<\/a>. . . FIRED<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00abI remember the first time I ever got fired from a job. I learned a lot. It was by a guy named Mr. Rogers, who was a heavy\u00a0 duty truck driver. This was when I was old enough to mow lawns. I mowed a lot of the lawns in the trailer park. He was the cheapest one. He only gave me $35 \u2013 of course they were small lawns. His Lawn mower was never in good shape anyway. He never kept the blades sharpened. I was supposed to cut with this thing?<\/p>\n

Well, one day he decided\u00a0 I didn\u2019t do a good enough job \u2013 he\u2019d always check the little edges and staff \u2013 and he fired me. And later, when he couldn\u2019t see me, I cried and cried. I mean I was just crushed. But he did say to me, \u201cNow, understand,\u201d<\/em> he said, \u201cLook, I\u2019m a foreman on a construction site\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

I couldn\u2019t relieve it when he first fired me. I just always assumed that everybody loved me. I was one of those kids, you know: nobody seemed toe ver say no to me, at least not in the adult world. Kids I didn\u2019t know much about, but adults I knew how to handle right away.<\/p>\n

He said, \u201cLook, when I\u2019m on a job and a guy doesn\u2019t do his work right, what do I do? I fire him. You were on a job. You didn\u2019t do your work right. You\u2019re fired.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t quite understand at the time. He was a real dour, Nasty man, like a loto f them living alone: no wife, alcoholic. But he had a good income \u2013 a real good income, real good at his job \u2013 and he felt strongly about the lesson he was teaching me. It wasn\u2019t that he did it simply for my Benedit. He felt strongly about the morality. At least he was nice enough to let me know. And I think he was absolutely a saint to do that for me. Really, I think he was absolutely a saint. When somebody doesn\u2019t do their job, you fire him. Much later in life I\u2019ve received such joy when at various moments I\u2019ve felt justified in the end to say, \u201cYou\u2019re fired!\u201d<\/em> Because people have the right to say no.\u00bb<\/p>\n

\"Ig\"<\/a>. . . Why I Do What I Do<\/strong><\/p>\n

‘I’m sure the constant exposure to amplifiers and electric guitars, and hearing my own voice amplified, has altered my body chemistry, in which, after all, the life lives.<\/p>\n

I often try to examine the reasons why I am doing what I do – working with electric guitars and drums and singing – or what I’m trying to do with. But I feel so umbilically connected to the thing itself, the process is far more important than the result. It is the proximity of the electric hum in the background and just the tremendous feeling of buoyancy and power, you know. When you start being in the presence of this power, you also become its witness. When guitars are played properly, hitting the same sound at the same time, a joyful thing happens; that’s good backing. You’re dangerously abandoned. It is the most honest experience I have ever encountered. Gotta have it. Once I started playing on stage, maybe even after the first gig, it was like a wolf after getting his first blood or something. As soon as I had a taste of that I just abandoned all interest in music and went right straight for the throat. I was really determined to use the noises \u00a0on myself, as if I were a scientist experimenting on himself, like Dr Jeckyll or the Hulk. Sometimes I feel like Hulk, actually. I really didn’t have any use for rationality or harmony – that was right out, you know. Stated harmonies, I didn’t want. I wanted more overtones. Really good music isn’t just to be heard, you know? It’s almost like an hallucination. So I’ve always liked chanced overtones. What I do is either abstract to you or it’s POW!’<\/p>\n

James Osterberg\u00a0 (<\/strong>aka Ig Pop):\u00a0\u00a0 I Need More\u00a0<\/em> <\/strong>[1980]<\/address>\n
\"gimme-danger\"<\/a><\/address>\n
\"\"<\/a><\/h6>\n
\u2666\u2192\u00a0 \u00a0<\/a>‘Five Foot One’<\/a>\u00a0 \u00a0\u21d3<\/strong><\/h6>\n