A live tribute to the late and amazing Ron Asheton will be released on DVD April 9th.  Ron Asheton Tribute Concert with Iggy & The Stooges + Special Guests was recorded almost two years ago to the date of the film's release and features Henry Rollins and Radio Birdman 's Deniz Tek as a guest guitarist. All info was provided by MVD Entertainment Group. Ron Asheton Tribute Concert with Iggy & the Stooges + Special Guests   Coming to DVD on April 9 Live concert tribute to brother Ron Asheton featuring the Stooges, Henry Rollins and more! Recorded live at the Michigan Theater, this heartfelt tribute/celebration of Stooge guitarist Ron Asheton's life and music featured Iggy and the Stooges, Henry Rollins, and guest guitarist Deniz Tek (Radio Birdman). Includes a string section on a few Stooges classics! All profits from the sale of the DVD go to the Ron Asheton Foundation which supports animal welfare and music. Gary Graff of BILLBOARD writes: ...

So, this is an Iggy Pop bobblehead.   This is available at Aggronautix . It's staring at you and it wants to kill you. Raw power. Image courtesy of Aggronautix Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

Got a spare $125? Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

Iggy & The Stooges Raw Power Live: In the Hands of the Fans MVD Entertainment Group Released: 4.5.11 Stereokiller review Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

It could be said that the 70s were a schizophrenic decade set on either purifying rock n’ roll ( Sabbath , Zeppelin ), putrefying rock n’ roll ( Styx , Bee Gees ), complicating rock n’ roll ( Rush , Yes ), glossing rock n’ roll ( Bowie , T-Rex ), or starting from scratch ( Ramones , Sex Pistols ). Inasmuch as the 60s as a whole, ( The Beatles and The Stones especially), can justifiably lay claim to the progression of rock music, even if its foundations were poured in the 50s by Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley , I believe the 70s have had the most profound and timeless effect on what we consider “rock,” especially with art and punk colliding and jazz and rock learning to coexist. In both you have Bitches Brew and Fun House , two diametrically opposed worlds birthed by a shared understanding that their respective genres had reached a peak. It was time to think differently once the 60s were over. Cover art for Rhino's 2005 Fun House reissue The same could be said for ideali...

2010 hasn't, for the most part, been the best year in terms of financial nonchalance. It would be safe to say that, if not for the generosity of record labels and PR reps, I'd have nothing to review and Letters From A Tapehead would probably shrink to irrelevance and ultimately disappear. But, I did manage to score a couple opportunities this year to hit the record stores, and though I sort of lagged as far as detailing my purchases, many of them have been 2010 albums that I've been meaning to discuss. So, my first record store trip happened in May as I was armed with some gift certificates. Chester County Book & Music Company , West Chester, PA: Butthole Surfers Hairway To Steven Latino Bugger Veil Originally Released: 4.11.88 (on Touch & Go) Michael Azerrad 's Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground, 1981-1991 is still, for me, music literature's wish list for pre-Alternative independents and Hairway To Steven was one of...

From Earsplit PR : Southern Lord Recording Artists SUNN O))) and BORIS will unite to perform as ALTAR -- as heard on their 2006 Altar full-length -- at the third annual All Tomorrow's Parties Festival in Monticello, New York. A varied barrage of of acts are confirmed to perform at this outdoor extravaganza in addition to ALTAR, including Iggy & The Stooges [performing Raw Power ], Sleep [performing Holy Mountain ], Sonic Youth , Mudhoney , Tortise , Brian Jonestown Massacre , Raekwon , Explosions In The Sky and more. ALTAR's performance shall take the headlining slot for Sunday, September 5th, the full day curated by legendary filmmaker Jim Jarmusch , who included selections from the Altar album and other Southern Lord artists in his 2009 film The Limits of Control . Altar is, admittedly, the album that got me to appreciate SunnO))). Seeing this line-up and knowing that SunnO))) and Boris will be joining forces makes me wish I'd moved to New York. Maybe som...

Raw Power ? Yeah, Raw Power . I can't imagine a bigger or more important reissue to be hitting the shelves this year. What little would exist without the brutality, energy or pure sexuality of Iggy & The Stooges ' brilliant Raw Power ? Those who've listened understand. Those who haven't listened need to so they can understand. Those who've listened and don't understand... well, you're a lost cause. Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

Can you feel the reissue gods getting all seminal on your asses? Legacy/Columbia is releasing a Deluxe Edition of the very necessary Iggy and The Stooges classic, Raw Power . The release date is April 27th. From iggyandthestoogesmusic.com : — The long out-of-print original David Bowie mix of the album, newly-remastered for maximum impact! — Georgia Peaches, an 8-song, one-hour performance at Atlanta’s notorious rock club Richards in October 1973 — A full disc of Rarities, Outtakes, & Alternates from the Raw Power Era. — 48 page softcover book with essays by Henry Rollins, Brian J. Bowe and Kris Needs + testimonials by Tom Morello, Lou Reed, Cheetah Chrome, Jim Reid, Perry Farrell, Hugo Burnham and more. — A TON of previously unseen Raw Power-era shots. — 5 exquisite 5x7-inch prints, suitable for framing. — Japanese pic-sleeve 45 single repro: "Raw Power" b/w "Search And Destroy" — The Making of Raw Power documentary by Morgan Neville featuring NEW inter...

Iggy Pop Préliminaires Astralwerks/Virgin Released: 6.2.09 No Ripcord review Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

So, after having lost fellow Stooge Ron Asheton earlier this year , Iggy Pop , citing his dissatisfaction with "idiot thugs with guitars banging out crappy music," is putting out a French-centric jazz album entitled, Preliminaires . Explaining his inspiration in a trailer for the album, Pop discusses New Orleans jazz and novelist Michel Houellebecq . Preliminaires is expected to release in the States in early June. In the meantime, news on the album is being tracked at a specialized blog . You can also hear some songs on the attached widget. Get the Iggy Pop widget and many other great free widgets at Widgetbox ! Like anything else Iggy does, it could be either remarkable or disastrous, but in light of the last Stooges album , I'm inclined to feel as though an absence of rock n' roll in Iggy's album might be beneficial. I'm slated to review the album for No Ripcord. Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

I found this small television tribute to the late and great Ron Asheton . Sincerely, Letters From A Tapehead

THIS is supposed to be the year. After playing a rendition of “Burning Up” in honor of Madonna last year as she was inducted into the Rock N’ Roll Hall Of Fame , it was decided that THIS was the year The Stooges would finally be given their shot at immortality, long overdue recognition for three ( The Stooges , Fun House and Raw Power ) of the greatest albums ever recorded. Unfortunately, Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton , brother to Stooges drummer Scott , won’t be there to share in the spotlight. Asheton was found dead today at the age of 60, having possibly suffered a heart attack. The Stooges perform “TV Eye” at the Cincinnati Pop Festival in 1970 With words, I find myself unable to perfectly capture my headspace every time I hear the opening riff of “I Wanna Be Your Dog” or the midway six-stringed assault of “TV Eye:” those perfect moments in perfect albums, rugged electricity spewing out of Ron Asheton’s fingertips with timeless ‘tude and energy. Those first two Stooges albu...

I'm on a couple different mailing lists for specialty music shops and collectors networks. Not being a huge collector necessarily, at least not in the philistine sense of the word, (I'd much rather just own the music than have an over-priced first edition of whatever that loses its value once you throw the needle on its out-of-print groove), I'm fascinated at the items that are still out there, begging to be owned for the cost listed on one astoundingly appraised price tag. You can imagine three or four generations of a family passing these records on and on and on until their worth is just shy of a baseball team or a mansion in Beverly Hills. Anyway, one such site is Esprit , which is a British site that specializes mostly in rare music collectibles. I've found a lot of hard to find Rollins Band and obscure Black Flag vinyl through them, so I like to keep track of their inventory. But, because it's a collectors site, sometimes they bumrush my inbox with drool...

The Stooges The Weirdness Virgin Released 3.07.07 Rating: 2 out of 10 In a little more than a week, Iggy Pop will be 60 years old. Consider this when you hear him push his throat to the max, showing very little wear and tear despite a career that would have a lesser man bibbed and broken, lips quivering as his nurse maid struggles to get a spoonful of strained carrots into his mouth. But, also consider this when you hear a lyric as grossly stupid as “my dick is turning into a tree,” (the album’s opening track, “Trollin’”) and realize that the big six-oh drove him to make that unnecessary observation. Hey, he can still rock, he can still get it up… The Stooges must still be amazing, right? ‘Fraid not. It’s 2007. Unfortunately for The Stooges, it’s not 1969 or 1970. Jumping off from a three-album legacy that brought alienation and hard rock to a new level of dismay at the hands (and ears) of rock critics and parents everywhere, Iggy and the brothers Asheton have come together to...