Iggy Pop will soon release his first album of new material since the passing of his Stooges bandmate, Ron Asheton. But if you’re expecting, you know, punk rock, be forewarned, you’ll probably have to search elsewhere come June 2nd. Entitled Préliminaires and produced by Hal Cragin, the Massachusetts native’s first solo effort in six years is described as “dangerously near jazz,” providing a score to the life of French author Michel Houellebecq, as well as Houellebecq’s 2005 novel, The Possibility of an Island.
Score to someone’s life? Yes, according to a recently issued press release. This all began when Pop was approached to write songs for a documentary about Houellebecq, who at the time was attempting to make a film adaptation of his own novel. “The project grew and grew and I found the emotions from my reading transforming themselves into music,” Pop explains. “I wrote less and less for the movie and started writing an alternative score to the novel.”
Préliminaires (which is French for “foreplay) offers the New Orleans-influenced “King of the Dogs” and the standard “Les Feuilles Mortes”, leading the way for that aforementioned jazz sound. The Godfather of Punk admits to have “grown weary of a career as an entertainer and I wish for a new life,” comparing his current state of mind to that of the novel’s main character. Pop further admits to having gotten “sick of listening to idiot thugs with guitars banging out crappy music.”
The album sure sounds like quite the departure from the most recent Iggy & the Stooges album, The Weirdness. I’ll go out on a limb and guess we won’t be hearing anything harkening back to “My Idea of Fun (Is Killing Everyone)”.
Préliminaires Tracklist:
01. Les Feuilles Mortes
02. I Want To Go To The Beach
03. King Of The Dogs
04. Je Sais Que Tu Sais
05. Spanish Coast
06. Nice To Be Dead
07. How Insensitive
08. Party Time
09. He’s Dead/She’s Alive
10. A Machine For Loving
11. She’s A Business
12. Les Feuilles Mortes (Marc’s Theme)