‘Soldier’: The Iggy Pop album derailed by a David Bowie fist fight
When people think of Glen Matlock and Iggy Pop, they think of anarchy and chaos, and how could they not? Glen Matlock was one of the brains behind the Sex Pistols. While he might not have been in the band when they reached stardom, he was pivotal in putting together the blueprint for the band. Meanwhile, Iggy Pop is… well… he’s Iggy Pop.
While a lot of the time, these two rebelled against societal norms and music that they found mundane and boring. However, sometimes their rebellious streak got in the way of one another’s creativity. This is what happened with Iggy Pop’s album Soldier, which was momentarily derailed because of the team Glen Matlock had working on it, and a friend Iggy Pop had asked to provide vocals.
Before we begin this story, I need to introduce you to Steve New. For those who don’t know, New was a guitarist and singer who performed with several bands, including Glen Matlock in Rich Kids. Shortly after Matlock had been kicked out of the Sex Pistols, he bumped into New down King’s Road and told him he was starting a band.
“He says ‘Yeah I’m putting a band together’,” recalled New, “I think I said to him, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll cut my hair’. And that was the start of the Rich Kids.”
While the Rich Kids might not have had a great deal of mainstream success, they were still very well-liked by a lot of people in the know, including musicians. One of these musicians was Iggy Pop, who was a big fan of Matlock and so asked him to come and work on the album Soldier. Given that Matlock and New were a punk-adjacent Lennon and McCartney during this period, they both went to work with Pop on the record.
Also on the record was the big name from the headline: David Bowie. His role in the project wasn’t all that clear, but he was there to lend a helping hand whenever it was needed. He was already cemented as a musical great at this point, and so having his name on any piece of work was a huge plus. It was also incredibly exciting for New, who was a big fan, but who resented Bowie shortly after meeting him, given how mundane some of his answers to New’s questions were.
“I was full of teenage anger at this guy who didn’t answer any of my questions; I asked him all about Low and Heroes,” said New, “I thought they were great albums and Bowie’s like ‘Yeah. They’re great albums’.”
New started to dislike Bowie, but the Starman really crossed a line when he supposedly started hitting on New’s girlfriend. He was dating Snatch singer Patti Palladin, and she said that she got the impression Bowie was flirting with her.
“One day Patti said ‘Did you pick up on it? Bowie thinks he’s going to fuck me’,” recalled New, “Patti tells me that, I open the door to my room, Bowie’s walking up the stairs, so I fucking jumped on him. We both fell down the stairs, it was great.”
Bowie was furious and left the recording sessions, having only contributed backing vocals to the track ‘Play It Safe’. Iggy Pop was furious with Matlock and New as well, so he cut a number of their recordings from the album. The fight completely derailed the music-making process, and the result was a fairly haphazard final product that didn’t live up to some of his other work.
