Iggy & The Stooges: California Bleeding

There have been plenty of good Iggy Pop covers. The Birthday Party's "Loose," Sisters Of Mercy's "1969," and Sonic Youth's "I Wanna Be Your Dog" are just a few of the more obvious ones. There are plenty of bad ones, too. In other words, there has been no dearth of tributes to Iggy Pop. One can only assume that the advantage of the new We Will Fall is that it is a benefit for the AIDS organization LIFEbeat, and that it brings the good and the bad together under one banner. The quality of some of the tracks is pretty obvious. If you set Pansy Division loose on "Loose," or drop "The Passenger" on the Lunachicks, you pretty much know that they're going to rock. Pleasant surprises come from Blanks 77's version of "Funtime" and Nada Surf's "I'm Sick of You." Head-shakingly bad songs are turned in by the likes of Sugar Ray ("Cold Metal") and D Generation ("I Got Nothing"). Overall, it's a fun album, and you get the added bonus of hearing a reformed Blondie (under the name Adolph's Dog) perform "Ordinary Bummer." It just goes to show that it's hard, though not impossible, to go wrong with Iggy. That is, of course, unless you are Iggy, and self-destruction is second nature. California Bleeding, the latest installment in Bomp! Records' Iggy Pop rarities series, features selections from three Iggy & The Stooges live shows from 1973-74. The songs are full of his well-documented energy, but the whole thing sounds like it was recorded through a tin-can telephone. His drugged-out ramblings are sort of funny, but that doesn't make the album worthwhile unless you're a well-funded purist. At some point, you might as well be trading Grateful Dead tapes.