At Dublin’s In The Meadows festival on June 8, punk icon Iggy Pop stormed through a wild, 90-minute set on Saturday. The 78-year-old music titan hadn’t played the city in over 20 years, and he made a triumphant return. Under bright lights at Royal Hospital Kilmainham, he blasted through songs that spanned fifty years of music, closing the festival with a thrilling show.
Pop kicked off with “TV Eye” from The Stooges’ 1970 album, Funhouse. Bare-chested in the cold air, he strutted and swaggered for most of the show. A quick wardrobe change saw him don a studded jacket with his name blazed across the back, but it didn’t stay on long.
Fans went wild for hits like “The Passenger,” “Death Trip,” “II Wanna Be Your Dog,” and the Trainspotting anthem “Lust for Life.” According to Hot Press, Pop said, “This is a song. I did it with The Stooges,” before playing “1970,” also called “I Feel Alright.” He continued, “We started in 1969, and then all of a sudden, it was 1970, and I couldn’t think of a better idea than to write a song about what did it feel like to be alive in 1970. Hit it!”
Pop jumped down to the crowd barriers again and again. The music changed from early Stooges cuts to solo work and plenty of tracks from his time with Bowie in Berlin. The Lambrini Girls, Billy No Mates, and Irish band Sprints took the stage before him, and his performance was a celebration of rock history.
His last Irish gig was a Stooges show at Slane Castle back in 2004. This comeback capped off year two of the In The Meadows festival, where the old guard meets new blood in rock music.
