Now that he’s gotten that surreal American Idol performance out of the way, Iggy Pop’s schedule is wide open for a pair of future studio releases that couldn’t be much more stylistically different: the first being a follow-up to 2009’s soft, jazz-inspired LP, Préliminaires, followed by a new Stooges record — the band’s first studio effort since the passing of guitarist Ron Asheton and reunion with Raw Power axeman James Williamson.

As the Guardian reports, the former album will showcase Pop’s Serge Gainsbourg-esque baritone on soft-rock covers of “American and French … classic tunes,” such as Fred Neil’s “Everybody’s Talking,” the Beatles’ “Michelle,” and songs by Gainsbourg himself. That Hal Cragin-produced set is due this winter. Meanwhile, Williamson and Pop have begun work on new Stooges material for a possible release in 2012 or the following year.

The latest chapter in David Lynch’s consistently interesting recent focus on music arrived today in the form of news of a 17-track charity compilation, curated by and set to benefit his David Lynch Foundation, which features exclusive tracks by Tom Waits, Iggy Pop, Peter Gabriel, Moby, Ben Folds, and many more artists. In exchange for a pledge of $18, DLF Music will provide all tracks in a digital format over the course of the next six weeks, with all proceeds going to their global effort to teach “stress-reducing, health-promoting meditation to one million at-risk youth and 10,000 veterans with PTSD.”

Waits’ exclusive contribution to the “Download for Good” campaign is a stripped-down live recording of “The Briar & the Rose,” a song the Rock Hall inductee wrote in 1993 for the album and William S. Burroughs-co-written play The Black Rider. You can hear a 90-second preview of the track alongside four more cuts from the comp right now and purchase/pledge thataway.

Speaking to Australia’s Triple J Radio recently, Iggy Pop discussed a biopic that was in the works with Elijah Wood attached to star as the Godfather of Punk. Suffice to say, the project remains indefinitely shelved as Pop has said on multiple occasions that he isn’t on board to participate in an extensive promo campaign (i.e. “jump out of cakes and do promotional things”). While Pop supports a “very artistic” Stooges documentary helmed by friend and past collaborator Jim Jarmusch, he doesn’t mince words regarding his interest in a film solely about his life: “They can wait for me to be dead.” And now for provocative Iggy quote #163,721:

If somebody did want to make a biopic of me I think they should get Lindsay Lohan actually. She looks like me and she’s the only one with enough attitude too. They could tape her boobs up or something. She’s been in jail at the right age and everything so I thought she could do it.

Sorry, Frodo. You’re just too well-adjusted to play the Iguana. 

“4 years of diving into the audience finally went wrong last night. The result: mild concussion, ripped ear, sprained wrist, lump on head. OUCH,” tweeted Gareth Campesinos! just after midnight yesterday. A photo of the bandaged-up frontman soon followed, captioned simply: “When stage-diving goes wrong. UNLOL.”

As stage-diving careers go, 4 years without incident makes for an honorable bullet point, I’d say, but let’s not forget that it took Iggy Pop 4 decades to reach the point at which “when [he] landed, it hurt.” While the Godfather of Punk may be retiring from the precarious practice, the Los Campesinos! singer will have only two weeks to heal those wounds before his next possible attempt as Exclaim points out that Los Campesinos! are booked for two more big UK festival gigs (Reading and Leeds) at the end of the month.

Get well soon, Mr. Campesinos!, long live your stage-diving endeavors, and just be glad nobody caught the spill on tape.

Last summer, we posted details and a trailer to a new documentary about legendary Beat writer William S. Burroughs, which features interviews with Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo, Laurie Anderson, the great Genesis P-Orridge, directors John Waters, Gus Van Sant, and David Cronenberg (of course), Jello Biafra, Patti Smith, and Stooge Iggy Pop. While a theatrical release date for William S. Burroughs: A Man Within was still in question at the time as festival screenings were still on the horizon, indieWIRE reports today that the doc will hit theaters, DVD, and television within the year.

Distributed by Beastie Boy Adam “MCA” Yauch’s film company, Oscilloscope, the documentary will also be offered at digital retail outlets this fall. What’s more, PBS will air the film within their “Independent Lens” series.

I, for one, can’t wait to see this film. Did I mention that Sonic Youth and Patti Smith provide the soundtrack while the guy who played RoboCop (Peter Weller) narrates? ‘Tis true. Check out the trailer (complete with a wonderful Iggy Pop freakout) below:

The Simpsons creator Matt Groening curated All Tomorrow’s Parties in Minehead, England this past weekend, featuring performances by She & Him, the XX, Joanna Newsom, Built to Spill, CocoRosie, Daniel Johnston, Hope Sandoval, the artists shown below and many more. Though plenty of excellent photographs have hit the Internet (here, here, and here for starters), it was video that we craved, and which the YouTube gods have now given us. Here are the best fan-shot clips uploaded so far from Iggy and the Stooges, Panda Bear, Spiritualized’s soundcheck, and Boredoms (feat. Hella’s Zach Hill, Oneida’s Kid Millions, Ponytail’s Jeremy Hyman, DMBQ’s Shinji Masuko, and others):

Now that the Stooges are finally in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and a certain classic lineup has reunited, Iggy Pop, James Williamson, Scott Asheton, Mike Watt, (and their record companies) have realized that it’s a perfect time to drop an epic reissue package surrounding their 1973 masterpiece, Raw Power. Though the Legacy Edition — which includes a remastered copy of the original record, a David Bowie-mixed version, and a vintage recording from a live show — drops tomorrow, we’re particularly looking forward to the Deluxe Edition that’s due out later this month, as it also features a DVD: The Making of Raw Power.

With commentary by the likes of the Smiths/Cribs/Modest Mouse’s Johnny Marr, Iggy, Henry Rollins, rock photographer Mick Rock, and many more, I can’t think of a better way to ruminate on one of the most influential albums in rock history. We have to a wait a few more weeks to check it out, but in the meantime, here’s an 8-minute teaser video of footage from the forthcoming DVD.

Watch the Iguana and friends talk Raw Power below:

As any longtime TwentyFourBit reader will tell you, we love a good Iggy Pop quote around here, but this latest quip from the Godfather of Punk is a bit unsettling to say the least:

“When I landed, it hurt,” Pop told WENN (via Spinner) of his failed attempt to stage dive at a Tibet House benefit show in NYC last month in which nobody caught the Stooges frontman, “and I made a mental note that Carnegie Hall would be a good place for my last stage dive. The audience were just like, ‘What are you doing?’”

One month later, Pop removed the stage dive from his onstage repertoire at the Stooges’ Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction, but it doesn’t look like that audience had a clue what he was doing either.

Perhaps the problem isn’t Pop, stage diving, or — as some will argue — that punk rock is newly-dead. Perhaps it’s these black-tie audiences. Come play in Berkeley, Iggy, and we’ll catch you!

One of the best parts (aside from the possibility of new music of course) about the Stooges’ Raw Power lineup reunion is that guitarist James Williamson has done a host of wonderful interviews since the announcement was made last fall. Speaking to Pittsburgh’s Post Gazette this week, Williamson reflected a bit on the band’s 4-decade-long career and offered a funny quip on their induction into the Rock Hall of Fame, which goes down tonight in New York City:

We were about to take pride in setting a record for not getting in. But lo and behold we did, and I secretly feel like ABBA might have something to do with it because I can just see the guys on the committee going, ‘Well, you know, if we put ABBA in, we’re going to take a lot of crap for this. We better put the Stooges in there to counterbalance it.

Perhaps this week’s “Musicblogocide 2010” fiasco reminded Thurston Moore that he registered a Blogger/Blogspot account back in ‘06, as the Sonic Youth guitarist just dropped about a dozen posts on his music, art, and poetry blog, dubbed “Flowers & Cream,” in the past two days alone.

Though the initial posts were pretty typical blog fare (a photo of Marianne Faithfull, a Youth Brigade album cover), Moore got a bit more comfortable late on his first day of blogging, posting new poem “7th floor overlooking manhattan bridge,” a photo and blurb from a recent performance, and, most recently, an awesome memoir/review of Iggy and the Stooges’ recently reissued classic Raw Power. Follow Friday Saturday!