Fun house (The Stooges) (LP 4577 - 4578)

The Stooges  The Stooges (Vinyl, Elektra Records, 1969) ****  

The Stooges  Funhouse (CD, Elektra Records, 1970) **** 

Genre: Punk rock 

Places I remember: Marbecks Records, JB Hi Fi

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: I Wanna Be Your Dog (The Stooges)

Gear costume: Loose (Fun House)

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Part 6; Part 7

Active compensatory factors: I love the anarchic energy around Iggy Pop (then Iggy Stooge) and his mates: Ron Asheton – guitar, Dave Alexander – bass, Scott Asheton – drums.

The debut album by the appropriately named Stooges is pure garage punk and in 1969, they were WAY ahead of their time when they married the idea of boredom with punk energy. Ron's fuzzy guitars and Iggy's banshee vocals are perfectly suited and the only thing missing on the debut is consistency. Personally I don't care for the ten minutes drone of We Will Fall.

Fun House was the second album in 1970. It sounds tougher and more unhinged than the John Cale produced debut. So, it doesn't have the charm and naivety of that first album, but it does muscle up. That said I find the final track (L.A. Blues) a cacophonous mess.

Where do they all belong? Two crucial albums that lead to the full-blown punk movement of the seventies in the UK and the USA.