Some more Stooge reviews

By Peter Bronson
The Valley News
Van Nays, California
Oct. 3, 1969

A group called The Stooges has released an album which may contain one of the worst songs ever written.
Now, a song titled "1969"' might be expected to contain some social comment or world view, right?
Well the Stooges start out with an announcement that "it's another year for me and you." and that they don't have anything to do. Moving right along, the head Stooge tells about how he used to be 21 (last year), and now he's going to be 22, and that's sad. And that's all.
The group is musical and shows some talent, both instrumentally and on the vocals but are they serious?

Iggy Stooge.

Iggy and the other three Stooges wrote their own songs, however, and unfortunately it's easy to understand the
words. The electric effects are all right, and Stooge's voice is palatable if monotonous.
But after "1969'' the poetic meaning is even more challenging to comprehend. One of the songs is called "I
Want to Be Your Dog."

By Peter Bronson
The Valley News
Van Nays, California
Jan. 1, 1971

The Stooges' new Elektra album "Fun House" just might be the worst album of the year.
Many groups are short on talent, but few capitalize on the situation.
Leader Iggy Stooge is noted for his wild and bizarre antics on stage.
He often appears topless, flails himself with the microphone and screams a lot.
This may be a curious thing to watch in person, but on record the Stooges have little to offer musically.
Their lyrics are generally unintelligible, which is an improvement over their first album last year.
On that one, the lyrics were easier to hear, and were poor.
Instrumentally, the monotonous drum beats and guitar chords create a noisy background for Iggy's screaming, and on
one cut you can hear him coughing.
When he sings in a normal voice he is fairly competent. Steven Mackay's sax helps a little, but even it degenerates at
times into aimless noise. In short, you had better be a die-hard fan of this strange group before you
buy "Fun House." It is indeed unique.

By Denny Burt
Winona Daily News, Minnesota
May 16, 1971

If you could somehow think of an extreme opposite of silence it would probably be something like The Stooges, a
few people from Detroit who make you wait an hour and a half before performing and then very calmly destroy you in
45 minutes. The Stooges reduce music to the simplest component: energy generating noise a half million volls strong.
Every song follows the "Kick Out the Jams" three chord repeat system.
But this is more than mere power tossed helter skelter from a bank of speakers.
The brilliance of the Stooges is that they funnel it through a single person.
The indomitable, the infamous, the notorious, the breathtaking, the legendary, the awesome, the terrible, the fascinating, the
bizarre, the intriguing, the frightening one and only Iggy Stooge.
He's the lead singer. Iggy's a vicious aggregate of Jim Morrison (soft sado-masochism),
and Jagger (epicene hands and body) and Elvis (s-e-x), and if you thought these names were little more than phantoms, look at Iggy.
I CAN REMEMBER FOLK stories generated years back of this kid or that who saw a Three Stooges short and took the slapstick literally and went out and bashed some kid's
head in just like on TV.
Iggy must be like this same kid grown up; well, at least a teen.
Part of Iggy's "act" is a replay of Curley's old hand actions, only backed up rhythmically with all that electricity.
There's an advantage to the Stooges relative obscurity in that they are forced to unleash all this mayhem in the confines of a club among a few hundred
people, a real tempest in a real teapot. When Iggy's not gyrating like limbs at the end of a high wire he flops on the floor, in people's laps, on tables, whatever's
handy and might work.
Iggy's probably the last of the great body singers, carried to a logical and absurd conclusion.
In the forty five minutes he was there I understood exactly two lines of lyric: "Who do you love?" and "It's a pack of lies".
I think. What you don't miss is Iggy winding his way from person to person, picking victims and assaulting with 450,000 volls.
This is all done topless, coconut oil smeared on face and torso then sprinkled with silver glitter, thigh exposed
through ripped jeans (the thigh's oiled and glittered too),and the last little compliment, a studded dog collar around
the neck, a kind of bondage Marlene Dietrich, if you've ever seen any of those old movies.
Real theatre of cruelty.
PRETTY SCARY TOO.
AND it's all over in forty five minutes.
There's usually a high casualty rate. Because just as everybody kind of despises this wriggling and aggressive little brat who's attacking without mercy, everybody envies
all that power being wielded.
So some people try to be Iggy, they take the microphone from him and stumble on stage and Iggy sits and waits till they're finished, then does it right.
The Stooges seem to have no problems simulating asylum atmospheres; they turn a rock and roll concert into a real
asylum.
What's most disturbing about the Stooges is not so much the intensity (here just isn't an imperative strong enough
for them) but the feeling they leave that all it is is just a step on the way to somewhere else, that it's the next step after vintage Doors or Rolling Stones, and that another step
will follow.
What could possibly make the Stooges seem as sedate as conversation?
What a question.
It'll happen.
The Stooges have two horrible albums on Electra, the first appropriately produced by John Cale of the old Velvet Underground.
Save your money for the real thing. They're nothing without their spectacle, and everything imaginable with it.

More suckers that simply didn't get it....

What fascinating reviews. Thanks very much for finding these.
Cheers,
Richard

It's obvious that those critics didn't play any instruments for sure. Or at least most of them, In My Honest Opinion. If Stooges sucked in their own words, why they wouldn't create a better band? What a bunch of wankers I've been listening to Sex Pistols lately. And I've gotta say that except Syd (maybe on a few songs) those guys CAN play. I thought why punk or rock'n'roll bands get so much criticism. I think there are several reasons. One of them is they play simple music. Both in sound and structures. It's true it doesn't require virtuosity. Other reason might be that these bands don't play e.g. progressive rock. Sincerely speaking, I don't give a SHIT who's more complicated or not. For me, complicated stuff = boring. One thing is SURE -> no matter if the Stooges or Pistols -> these guys HAVE TALENT. Otherwise, why would they become so famous? There must have been something about them, that delighted the record industry. You don't have to agree with that all, of course But that's what I wondered

People that obviously didn't get it. They can enjoy their 15 minute long Yes and Genesis drum solos because they really don't know anything about music.

Talent should ever come into music. Either something sounds good or it doesn't. And The Stooges sounded a lot better than just good.

Proof if proff be needed that they were way ahead of their time.

And 1969s lyrics do have a social commentary. There was nothing to do...and its still that way.

Monotonous drums!? Is there such a thing?

It may be a matter of taste. I never cared for long solos, drums bass or otherwise. Lord knows, I sat thru enough of them in the 60s 70s!
I cant really say that Yes isnt good, I just dont really like them. As far as Im concerned, if a song lasts more than 3 minutes, its not rock. And a musican who chooses to limit what he plays is much better than one who crams all the notes he can play in a solo. Guess thats why I dont like much metl, either.

Quote :

And a musican who chooses to limit what he plays is much better than one who crams all the notes he can play in a solo.

I guess your right. I mean any band out there can give their all on one song and then they have nowhere else to go cause all their ability was wasted one number. In the words of Jack Black "There are some bands out in the world who have a deep resevoir of rocket sauce. Some bands, there supply is so small that they use it all up on one song. But other bands, there the real deal. Their bottle of sauce is so big and filled to the brim, that they can go on and on for decades and decades and still theres sauce coming out." Or something like that