ABC/Randy HolmesHappy 70th birthday Iggy Pop!
That’s right, the original Stooge, who once checked himself into a mental institution to help him kick his drug habit, has made it to the ripe old age of 70.
Born James Newell Osterberg, Jr., April 21, 1947, Pop founded The Stooges in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1967. The band’s noisy, primitive style and confrontational performances in the late 1960s and early 1970s helped lay the groundwork for the punk rock explosion in the mid-1970s.
By then, David Bowie had taken Pop under his wing, bringing Pop along on his Station to Station tour. Bowie would produce and co-write two albums for Pop — The Idiot and Lust for Life, the title track of which would become Pop’s signature song and would find new life when it was featured in the movie Trainspotting in 1996.
In recent decades, Pop has become something of an elder statesmen of proto-punk, showing up everywhere from the Nickelodeon show The Adventures of Pete and Pete to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
In the new millennium, Pop reunited with his surviving Stooges band mates, who were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010, though original Stooges guitars Ron Asheton died in 2009. His brother, drummer Scott Asheton, died in 2014.
Last year, Iggy’s collaborative album with Queens of the Stone Age‘s Josh Homme, Post Pop Depression, earned a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album. Pop also got an Oscar nomination this year for his song “Gold” from the Matthew McConaughey movie of the same name.
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