Virgin Records
2001
Beat Em Up
About This Album
Love it or hate it, Beat Em Up is inarguably one of the most appropriate titles Iggy Pop attached to an album in years; after an ill-advised detour into something resembling jazz on 1999's Avenue B, Iggy shifted gears again and served up his most physically punishing album since American Caesar in 1993. Beat Em Up starts out promisingly enough with "Mask," a hyperinsistent three-chord blast that, with its energetic riffing and manic vocals, sounds more like a prime Stooges number than anything he's cooked up in ages. But about halfway through the song, Iggy launches into a hysterical tirade against a number of cultural abuses common to modern-day America, and for every moment that he hits a nail on the head ("Irony in place of balls/Balls in place of brains/Brains in place of soul") there's at least one or two bits you can only hope he's joking ("Junkie frat boys in their shorts!"). And that pretty much sets the tone for the album; when Whitey Kirst's guitar isn't trying to split the difference between Ron Asheton-esque groove and speed metal shred, Iggy is ranting about one thing or another that annoys him until he sounds like a cross between Dennis Miller and the wino on the corner who yells at you when you won't give him a dollar.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4 and 5)

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