Too loud for success. Too weird to be forgotten.
This is about a band that wasn't even metal, but ended up carving the path for it anyway.
Motörhead in 1975? Groundbreaking.
Snarling, filthy, speed-fueled noise. Something no one had heard before. Lemmy said as much—and in interviews, he made it clear who actually set him off: not Black Sabbath, not Zeppelin, but the glorious chaos of MC5. A name I hadn’t even heard until last week. (Yes. I know. Shame. Slap on the wrist. We’re learning.) But digging into MC5, another name came up—and this one lit a fuse in my memory.
Iggy and the Stooges.
Now that I knew.
Growing up, Iggy Pop was basically background radiation in our house. Ubiquitous. Eternal. Equal parts comforting and unhinged. My stepfather played him constantly, which means I grew up associating raw punk weirdness with breakfast cereal and homework.
And when I was twelve, in what I can only describe as a moment of deeply cursed tween sincerity, I made a window colour version of the Naughty Little Doggie album cover for his birthday. We're talking 1996 or 1997, peak DIY horror.
AND IT’S STILL THERE.
Still clinging to his bathroom mirror more than two decades later—looking creepy as hell. That's what parental love looks like, people.
The Stooges (aka Sonic Mayhem with Blenders)
Anyway. The Stooges.
I dove into their history next on my metal origin quest. And yeah, they’re not metal—not by genre. But make no mistake: they helped build the damn foundation.
The 2016 doc Gimme Danger lays it all out. Highly recommended. Early footage from 1968–1973, iconic chaos, and a whole lot of shirtless screaming. What more could you want?
The Stooges started life as The Psychedelic Stooges (solid name, no notes) in 1967 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Jim Osterberg—better known to the world as Iggy—had been banging drums since childhood, playing in a high school band called The Iguanas. Hence: Iggy.
He played drums in a few bands until he had a revelation that can only be described as spiritually punk:
“I got tired of looking at other people’s butts.”
—And with that, he launched himself into the spotlight.
The Stooges were born.
Iggy on vocals. Ron Asheton on guitar. Scott Asheton on drums. Dave Alexander on bass.
And to be clear: they weren’t great musicians. They didn’t care. They looped riffs into oblivion, built instruments from scratch, brought blenders and vacuum cleaners onstage, and let Iggy go absolutely feral in front of unsuspecting audiences. Picture Jim Morrison, but less “poetic brooding” and more “shirtless goblin screeching into the void.”
In 1968, both MC5 and the now-trimmed Stooges signed with Elektra Records. MC5 got $20,000. The Stooges got $5,000. (Punk economy, baby.)
Still, they cranked out their debut album The Stooges in 1969. Tracks like I Wanna Be Your Dog and No Fun were adored by musicians, even if the mainstream didn’t get it yet. In 1970, they dropped their second album Fun House. Still not a commercial hit. But the cult was growing. And so were the crowds.
Also: Iggy invented stage diving. Allegedly.
The first time he leapt into the audience, they moved. He hit the floor, cracked his teeth, and just kept going. Iconic.
High, Loud, and Unstable
Things went downhill fast (as they do).
Dave Alexander got fired in 1970 after showing up too drunk to play. Five years later, he was dead—pneumonia following alcohol-induced pancreatitis. Tragic.
By 1971, the whole band was high out of their minds. Performances were a gamble. Elektra dropped them.
But then: David Bowie. Bowie saw something in Iggy—got him a new record deal, helped reassemble the band with James Williamson on guitar (Ron moved to bass). Together, they gave us Raw Power in 1973. It flopped commercially.
AND YET.
Raw Power is now considered one of the most influential albums in the history of punk, grunge, and metal. Its DNA is everywhere. It’s raw, feral, unfiltered—everything that would later define the genres that came after.
By 1974, it was over. Too many drugs. Too much chaos. Iggy went solo. The Asheton brothers kept playing, scraping by. James Williamson left music entirely and had a full-on engineering career at Sony. (Yes. Really.)
The Stooges reunited in 2003. When Ron Asheton died in 2009, Williamson returned. They released their final album Ready to Die in 2013.
Scott Asheton passed away in 2014.
And that was that.
Punk, Metal, Grunge—They All Owe This Mess
Compared to the 50-year saga of Judas Priest, the story of The Stooges is barely a blink. But what a violent, brilliant blink it was.
They kicked the door open for every unhinged punk and glam metal band that came after.
The Sex Pistols. The Ramones. The Damned.
Motörhead. Mötley Crüe. Def Leppard.
They all drank from the blood-smeared chalice of Raw Power.
Even Kurt Cobain worshipped at that altar—calling it his favourite album of all time and naming James Williamson's guitar work as a massive influence.
It wasn’t just the sound. It was the speed, the rage, the abandon.
“I Just Wanna Be.”
What struck me most watching Gimme Danger was how deeply these guys lived their music.
This wasn’t a costume.
It wasn’t marketing.
It wasn’t curated chaos for TikTok clicks.
They were broke, drugged out, half-alive—and they still crawled onto every stage like it was the only thing keeping them breathing. Because it was.
“I don't wanna belong to the glam people, I don't wanna belong to the hip hop people, I don't wanna belong to any of it. I don't wanna belong to the TV people, or alternative people, none of it. I don't wanna be a punk. I just wanna be.”
—Iggy Pop, Gimme Danger (2016)
And maybe that’s why the legacy stuck.
They didn’t try to be anything.
They just were.
Listen. Loud. Bleed It.
So: turn up the volume.
This is Gimme Danger, live. From Raw Power.
The version I love most.
Iggy’s still watching from the bathroom.