This is the DVD and Blu Ray edition of a performance of Raw Power by Iggy & The Stooges‘ at the All Tomorrow’s Parties festival in September 2010, not long after the untimely death of founder member Ron Asheton. The CD edition included all eight songs (albeit reordered) from their classic third album alongside single cut “I Gotta Right,” and Alan Holmes‘ review of the disc can be read [post=iggy-stooges-raw-power-live-hands-fans text=”here”].
Leaving the musical content to the review for the most part, it’s worth noting that the sound on the video is excellent throughout, and the performance by the band is exemplary in its energy and vigour. James Williamson rejoins The Stooges onstage for the first time since 1973 to recapture his contribution to Raw Power, while Mike Watt continues to hold down bass duties which were originally taken on by Ron Asheton when the album was recorded.
But the difference about this particular video is the way it was produced; geeks, enthusiasts and super-fans of The Stooges were invited to submit entries for the band and ATP to choose which lucky winners would get to film the gig and interview the band. The chosen film crew pretty much fitted the requirements to a T, as their own entries and the resulting film shows. It’s a little disconcerting, but their enthusiasm is certainly genuine, and their film-making skills have a neatly rough quality which sets the shooting apart from most live concert footage shot by professionals, taking the perspective of, as the title says, fans rather than the slick perspective of those for whom shooting a show is a day job.Best of all though is the after-show interview, where the band respond to questions (well flagged in advance – they formed part of the winners’ video competition entries) in a generally enthusiastic manner. There’s much of interest to other Stooges fans to be gleaned from their discourse, and for anyone with an interest in the history and development of rock music outside the mainstream too. Iggy Pop in particular – or is that Jim Osterberg? – is in relaxed form with his muscular onstage persona left at the stage door in place of a bespectacled academic intellectual, recounting how a band who intended to make Harry Partch-inspired noise happenings and ended up re-invigorating rock’n’roll along the way.
-Linus Tossio-
OK, first things first. Until The Light Takes Us isn’t really a music movie. It’s not a musical, for a start, though that would be awesome. Can you fucking IMAGINE how awesome that would be??? It isn’t a musical, though. It’s not even a movie ABOUT music, because while it DOES talk about the music, it moves swiftly on. It’s kind of a movie about musicians, because all its leading characters are musicians, but their musicianship is not really the issue – fuck it. Let’s start here. Let’s get that can, rip the lid off and chuck the worms out onto the newly-painted floor. Until The Light Takes Us is about Norwegian Black Metal.
