Iggy and the Stooges: Ready to Die (Warners)

Iggy -- after that brilliantly intuitive period which encompassed three Stooges albums and The Idiot/Lust For Life solo albums with Bowie -- was always a smart button-pusher.

So here -- with surviving Stooges and others making an excellent noise we'd have to concede -- you can almost see his finger hovering: Sex and Money (tick); "i got a job and I'm sick of it" (tick, but hardly one the checkout kid or me can relate to); a cynical pop take on the USA and guns (tick); some thoughftful ruminations as befits his senior stateman position (tick, tick) . . .

Yes, there's much to like here and this is waaaay better than most of the forgettable if not unplayable albums he has served up in the past couple of decades.

In that regard he's like Lou Reed has been since '92, always better enjoyed for his iconic status and in the absence of largely embarrassing and inconvenient new albums.

Okay, Iggy yelps he's ready to die and he still has a great sense of humour (check this clip), but again you feel much of this will be hailed because of who he is rather than what he's doing.

That said, there are just enough songs here -- mostly the more reflective ones than the button-pushers -- where you do actually hear an artist at work.

The spoken word album (listen to The Departed) or a Rick Rubin-styled re-think might not be far off.

Or not because . . . he's ready to die?

Yeah, sure.