Iggy Pop Wants to Be Free

Iggy Pop returns with a new album, titled Free, on Sept. 6 via Loma Vista, but don’t expect a continuation of the assertive guitar rock found on 2016’s Post Pop Depression. On the contrary, it’s a decidedly more meditative effort, recorded with jazz trumpeter/composer Leron Thomas and guitarist Sarah Lipstate, better known as Noveller. Says Iggy, “This is an album in which other artists speak for me, but I lend my voice…

“By the end of the tours following Post Pop Depression, I felt sure that I had rid myself of the problem of chronic insecurity that had dogged my life and career for too long,” he continues. “But I also felt drained. And I felt like I wanted to put on shades, turn my back, and walk away. I wanted to be free. I know that’s an illusion, and that freedom is only something you feel, but I have lived my life this far in the belief that feeling is all that is worth pursuing; all that you need – not happiness or love necessarily, but the feeling of being free.

“So this album just kind of happened to me, and I let it happen.”

Photo by Harmony Korine.