12.03.2020
MUSICIANS ON MUSICIANS IGGY POP & ELVIS COSTELLO
Rolling Stone: Andy Greene: December 3rd 2020
The old friends on surviving the Seventies, why most hard rock is overrated, and staying in touch with their iconoclastic inspiration
Elvis Costello was less than 24 hours into his first American tour when he met Iggy Pop. It was November 1977, and the former Stooges frontman was playing at the Old Waldorf in San Francisco when a bleary-eyed Costello, fresh off a flight from London, wandered into the venue just in time to see Iggy sing “The Passenger.
“My memory of it was I was slightly scared,” Costello tells Iggy. “At one point, you got this tiny chair and inserted yourself into it. It was kind of like if you took Marlene Dietrich and put her in a rock & roll band.”
When the show was done, Costello was ushered backstage for a quick chat. “You put your arm around me and said, ‘Just take care,’ ” Costello continues. “You were very kind, and I’ve never, ever forgotten it.”
It was the start of a long-distance friendship that culminated last year, when Iggy recorded a French-language cover of “No Flag,” from Costello’s new LP, Hey Clockface, which we are premiering today. Right now, Iggy is at his home in Miami and Costello is in Vancouver. They greet each other warmly once the Zoom begins (Elvis calls Iggy “Jim”) and spend the next 90 minutes talking about each other’s greatest music, high and low times in the Seventies, and their lives during Covid-19.