Unfinished business for STOOGES

[KiwiCoromandel]

Ron Asheton has seen Iggy Pop do number twos on stage, throw watermelons at the crowd, and pick fights with a gang of burly bikers.

And the Stooges' guitarist has witnessed the more serious stuff too, like the effects of Iggy's rampant drug addiction when the Stooges were at their height in the late 60s and early 70s. One night before a gig Iggy was so wasted after snorting a line of what he thought was cocaine, but was actually the hallucinogenic THC, that he was simply thrown out on stage where he collapsed in a heap. The band apparently played the opening riff of Raw Power for 15 or so minutes before the singer burbled lyrics at half speed.

These sorts of stories are why Iggy had a reputation for being dangerous and the Stooges' music equally so.

However, now that the band is back together after more than 30 years and their new album The Weirdness is out, Asheton sees a more level-headed Iggy Pop.

"Back then, you gotta remember we were younger," he says with a friendly laugh. "He's more of a professional now; he's groomed his act, and he's more involved with the business side. But there's still that edge and he can be just as crazy sometimes, if not more than in the past."

Anyone who remembers the Stooges' performance at the 2005 Big Day Out will attest to that.

"Iggy still gets injured, and mostly for him it's cuts from barricades and when he does get in the crowd people aren't really mauling him, but just getting manhandled so much you do get scratched up. We carry a first aid kit and everyone is always amazed that he heals so quickly. He might have a huge scratch on his chest or face and it's gone in two days. Sometimes I worry about him because he could get killed if that speaker stack wanted to tumble down. But it's that combination of amazement, humour and fear of seeing him do that stuff that makes it fun."

At the grand old age of 58 Asheton is having fun being in the Stooges again because it didn't end happily the first time round when the band called it quits in 1973. Their last gig was at the Michigan Palace in February of that year.

The Stooges' lifestyle back then was so volatile and constantly on the verge of collapse that it was never going to last.

"We never really sold a lot of records. We didn't have a giant fan base, apart from our hometown area of southeast Michigan and New York. We had a cult following but the original Stooges never went to Europe. We got together in '68, we recorded that record, then we had '69, '70 and by '71 it was pretty much gone. We didn't last long," says Asheton flippantly.

For him, there are two Stooges - the originals who he prefers to be associated with, and the Stooges from the Raw Power era. For some, that 1973 album is the band's best but Asheton sees it as an Iggy Pop solo record.

The short version of the story goes that the band took a break after Fun House and during that time Pop and David Bowie became friends. By this time they had added second guitarist James Williamson and Bowie took Pop and Williamson to Britain, got them a record deal and along with the Asheton brothers (Ron's brother Scott played drums) they recorded Raw Power, which is considered a cornerstone in early punk rock.

The thing was, Asheton played bass and Williamson guitar.

"I had a good time, I was grateful I got to play bass, because I played bass in my high-school band but to me that doesn't seem like the Stooges," says Asheton today. "I wasn't playing guitar for one thing and I didn't get any credit for writing any songs, and I didn't really write much other than suggest things. It wasn't the same," he adds, still slightly miffed.

He remembers the first two albums, the self-titled 1969 debut and 1970's Fun House more fondly. On the Stooges he says he and Scott had never been inside a recording studio and they were still learning their instruments.

"We were young, a little intimidated by the studio, but not terribly so because we were rather brash young fellows," he says.

With Fun House - a classic, and arguably their best album because it captures the band's scorching live sound - they had been on the road for a year and honed their playing.

"We were more confident and when you're more confident you can play more into your instrument," he says.

Despite being sidelined on Raw Power, Asheton was all for the band reforming in 2003. However, the Stooges' reunion started happening even before Pop's involvement. Mike Watt, from bands the Minutemen and Firehose, who now plays bass in the latest Stooges lineup, was playing with J. Mascis from Dinosaur jnr in Asheton's hometown of Ann Arbor and they asked him to come down and do a few Stooges songs with them.

"I wound up doing five and had such a good time." He laughs. It was so successful that they toured the US and Europe doing Stooges songs.

"People loved it and they'd come up afterwards and say, 'We love Iggy but we still feel like we've seen the Stooges because we've seen you play guitar and your brother play drums'."

Then, in 2003, Pop was putting together his Skull Ring album and asked Asheton if he'd be keen to do a "project". Iggy said he could come to the recording sessions with or without songs. "'It's up to you', he said," says Asheton. It was only the night before that Asheton decided he'd better have a new song on hand by way of an ice breaker between the two former bandmates.

"That became [the song] Skull Ring, and we hit it off so well, both personally and in the studio, that we wound up doing four songs."

That led to the Stooges' first show back together at the 2003 Coachella music festival in California. That same year they got together, started writing new songs and Asheton knew they had an album in them.

"I came up with 42 pieces of music, Iggy and my brother came up with things, and we put them all together so we had a bunch to choose from. So once I hooked up with Iggy and my brother, I knew it was clear sailing just because of the chemistry between all three of us."

So The Weirdness is unfinished business?

"The original Stooges never really had a chance to fulfil its potential because of things that happened. So yeah, it is unfinished business and it's cool and I always look at it like it took the world all this time to catch up with the Stooges. Or, my other corny phrase is, 'The Stooges are like fine wine and good cigars; they're not before their time'." He laughs.

source:LOWDOWN

image:reuters:The STOOGES today (from left) Iggy Pop, Scott and Ron Asheton...