The Stooges
The Weirdness

THE REVIEW

What a shame... It took them thirty years to get back together (29 to be precise) after the 1996 reunion attempt failed because Iggy Pop was too busy performing concerts and making money for the first time after a struggling career. Then it took them another three years to make a full album, after giving us a taste with "Skull Ring" in 2003, which was yet another piece in Iggy's discography, and after spending three years performing concerts around the world day in and day out.
One would really have expected something more from this "decent but unremarkable" album (a definition that's not mine but which I fully agree with). At least a good dose of raw and angry energy, with enough fuel - if nothing else - to ignite the fire that would have consumed everything with final fury, taking it all away like a ship leaving, burning in a grand Viking funeral, the bow turned towards the morning of an honorable end beyond the Pillars of Hercules of Rock'n'roll. Just to keep a bit of honor, for heaven's sake, instead of singing "My idea of fun is killing every one", unfortunately the old fan's heart would have wished that Iggy had found another way to tell us that even at 60 years old, he's just not having fun. Many things already heard (in the same "Weirdness" infinite echoes of the sounds of "American Caesar", 1993) but worsened by a demonstration of ennui infinitely more banal, in "I'm fried" the continuation (?) of "Little electric chair" and so forth for 12 somewhat useless songs where - as Alice Moore wrote - "I expected the energy of Funhouse and found the B-sides of Ugly Kid Joe" with Iggy confessing to us (in "You can't have friends") that "I wanna be your friend to the bitter end" and the guitar soundscape of Ron Ashton sliding away in little bursts that never wound (and just as well that Steve Albini was producing). Well, I think the bitter end is definitely here.