Duggie and the cycle ride (that's where he's been...) - Iggy and The Stooges...

Hello!

I'm back...[sorry? who are you? - "I'm Duggie, Duggie Chop. You know me. I was sitting around like, talking about music with me mate. Loads of people surrounding us, some real, some figments...or fig rolls...or...perhaps I'm just hungry after all this cycling..." Oh, cycling, I wondered where you'd been. Did remember you really!]

Once again, hello!

Back in May, I was all set to take a breather. To return to me and me mate sitting down, fishing, reviewing the records that matter to us - for you, dear reader, when...I pressed play on me iPod and there was The Stooges:"Search and Destroy"off Raw Power[I'm a street-walking cheetah with a heart full of napalm..."yep, that's how it starts"]

So, I kept cycling and the iPod kept shuffling Iggy Pop and Stooges tracks. And I remembered going to see Iggy at the old Hammersmith Odeon back in 1986...totally hyperactive, he didn't stop moving, even when the music had finished, jiggling on and off the stage like a walking epileptic fit...then I was back in the late '60s with 'No Fun' - total boredom in a song, and such and exciting thing to listen to. Inspiration for the punks in the 70s, like the Sex Pistols who covered it.

Oh yeah, and I just remembered, Malcolm [McLaren) copped it while I've been away, no more cash from chaos...and the world has slipped on.

Slipped on into an entirely more boring period, when you can make money but you can't have fun...

"Hey Duggie," said Duggie's mate, cycling just behind Duggie, where d'ya put that tupperware container with last night's Lasagne in it?"

"Bloody Hell, you always muck up my train of thought. I was just going to say that Iggy and the Stooges were the original punks."

His mate thought for a moment, then concentrated once more on the cycle path as he'd neglected to see a small rock under his wheel and had to rescue his handle bars from spinning round, "oh, suuugaaaaaar...woah."

"Are you agreeing? Or what?" said Duggie, pulling the Lasagne box from the deep inside pocket of his mountaineering anorak.

"Um. Yeah, s'pose so. I'd like to include 'Love' as well. Cos they were proto-punks, too."

"Proto-punks? What you swallowed an edition of Mojo or something?"

With that they stopped and set up the camping stove to warm up the Lasagne.

"Let's review one of Iggy's records next," said Duggie.

"Ok, but first we've got to follow-up some of the other stories. I mean, we haven't heard from Nels and Hair Tom for ages, that artist is still in his never-to-open-cafe..."

"And what happened to Sergei the fledgling chip shop owner?"

"And Geoffrey from Rainbow...and the Pike."

["Oi! What about me?" (the voice of Mr Stickleback) "Never ind that bleedin' Pike!"]

The Lasagne started to bubble. Mr Ting was passing with a chip delivery and, as luck would have it, had a surplus ("trouble-makers, you know, they make up addresses and have me running all over the city with unwanted soggy chips!") So furnished Duggie and his mate with a couple of portions to go with their meal.

"Life's great, isn't it?" said Duggie.

The clouds were building-up, filtering the meagre sunshine.

"Life's great," said his mate.