Lust For Life

That thundering, unstoppable drum tattoo opening the title track is one of rock's great starting pistols — a beat so bullish it now sells cruises and beer, which is its own strange revenge on a song about wreckage.

David Bowie's fingerprints are all over this — he co-wrote and produced, and you can hear his hand in how the Berlin-era clarity keeps Iggy's sneer from dissolving into mess. "The Passenger" rides a circular two-chord riff and that famous wordless refrain, turning a passenger's window-gazing into something both blank and euphoric. Underneath the swagger there's real damage, the sound of a man cataloging his own appetites without flinching. The trick of the record is how buoyant it makes all that ruin feel.