Iggy Pop: Naughty Little Doggie Virgin Records / America VUSMC 102

Iggy, too, has managed to follow up a sterling work (1993's American Caesar) with a comparatively shameful, slack piece of work. Not that Iggy has much coherent grasp of the notion of shame: the id to Lou Reed's ego, he's spent most of his 48 years on a personal crusade of self-abasement as art, shaming more serious "performance artists" by his dedication to the cause of personal exposure.

Where American Caesar offered a stern, politicised Iggy's pronouncements on The State Of The World, Naughty Little Doggie finds him yapping about nothing much in particular and doing what naughty little doggies are wont to do in mixed company. In "Pussy Walk", he finds himself "surrounded by Latin American and dark women" and can't resist making public his sexual musings. "All you men can relate to this," he avers, trying to spread the blame like a blue comedian in lead-balloon mode. This is a speyed version of the Iggy who once wanted to be our dog, though: songs like "Keep On Believing", "Heart Is Saved" and "I Wanna Live" suggest that his once proudly tumescent nihilism is growing increasingly flaccid with age.