Just finished this book last night. It's not the best rock bio I've read* but it gets the job done. The main theme of the book is that Jim Osterberg and Iggy Pop are two separate personalities and the singer has spent a good part of his adult life trying to find a balance between the two. There's Iggy, a raving, narcissistic, drug-addled sex fiend of a frontman. And then there's Jim Osterberg, the well-spoken, personable intellectual that cleared the path for multiple generations of rock musicians.
The one major flaw of this book is that author Paul Trynka doesn't always seem to grasp what's really necessary to include and what is superfluous information. For example, he rushes through the Stooges' golden years but fills page after page of what Iggy and Bowie did in Berlin while they weren't making music; what hotels they stayed in, what cafes they ate in, what clubs they hung out in, etc. That being said, there are still plenty of juicy bits to this book and it's definitely worth reading for any Iggy fan.
*That's a close toss-up between Jimmy McDonough's Shakey (Neil Young) and Dougal Butler's Full Moon (Keith Moon)
And now a little Iggy treat:
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