The rhythm of R&B: How Iggy Pop’s ‘Lust For Life’ was indebted to Motown
Motown’s infectiously soulful output typified the pop charts of the 1970s and beyond, but the impact of the Detroit powerhouse rippled throughout the entirety of the global music scene, inspiring everyone from The Beatles to proto-punk mastermind Iggy Pop.
It was back in 1959 that Motown Records released its very first hit single, taking the form of Barrett Strong’s ‘Money (That’s What I Want)’. From that point onwards, there was rarely a week during which the US pop and R&B charts weren’t chock-full of Motown stars, ranging from the vocal powerhouse of Diana Ross to the politically-charged social songwriting of Marvin Gaye. It is not egregious to claim, therefore, that Motown was the pop cultural movement which typified the US during the 1960s.
With that unparalleled influence over popular culture, Motown’s presence was felt in vast swathes of music scenes and artists who came up during that era, whether they were signed to Berry Gordy’s label or not.
The British Invasion period, for instance, saw groups like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones openly and routinely highlight Hitsville USA as a key source of inspiration on their work. Even the age of the hippie counterculture had some debt of gratitude to the R&B sounds of Motown’s output, when looking at the incredibly soulful voices of performers like Janis Joplin or Grace Slick.
A potentially much more unexpected influence, however, was that which was bestowed upon Iggy Pop. For much of the 1960s, Pop – another Detroit native – was heavily immersed in the defiant, grassroots sounds of the garage rock boom. His group, The Stooges, were perhaps the heaviest, wildest, most anarchic, and most drug-fueled band of the decade, and their sound was worlds apart from the pop-centric optimism of Motown. Even still, Pop couldn’t escape the ever-present influence of the label.
Even those who aren’t intimately familiar with Pop’s extensive back catalogue will probably be aware of his 1977 solo effort ‘Lust For Life’. An insatiable, high-energy earworm which helped to launch Pop’s career as a solo artist, in addition to inspiring a countless number of future punk, post-punk and alternative anthems, and even soundtracking one of the most iconic independent films of all time in Trainspotting, the song has a colossal reputation. A lot of that reputation, though, is down to the incredible drumbeat at the heart of the song.
The drumbeat in question was provided by Pop’s then-drummer, Hunt Sales, but was reportedly inspired by the call signal for the Armed Forces Network in Berlin. On the contrary, Pop and Sales weren’t the first to employ that beating rhythm. A decade prior, the beat featured in The Supremes’ Motown anthem ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’, and again in Martha and the Vandellas’ ‘I’m Ready For Love’ a few months later.
Both of those Motown hits were penned by the label’s songwriting crown jewels, Holland-Dozier-Holland. Responsible for more hit records than anybody else in Motown’s history, the songwriting trio were almost solely responsible for turning The Supremes into stars, and tracks like ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ were everywhere in the 1960s as a result. It is incredibly unlikely – though, admittedly, not impossible – that neither Pop nor Sales, nor David Bowie (who played a colossal role in developing Lust For Life), had ever heard those songs before.
Admittedly, the similarities between Motown’s R&B empire and the adrenaline-fueled punk spirit of ‘Lust For Life’ start and end with the drumbeat. Still, it is certainly worth noting just how far and wide the conventions and characteristics of Motown Records spread during the 1960s and beyond.
