Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell: The Dangerous Glitter Of David Bowie, Iggy Pop & Lou Reed
by Dave Thompson

Iggy, Ziggy and the Phantom Of Rock’s love-hate triangle

The concept here is to chart the intertwining paths of the three artists who gave the 70s their most intriguing, shocking or simply greatest musical moments. Bowie, Iggy and Reed have already had an abundance of biographies (some untoppable) but Thompson still has to skim through the trio’s earlier lives before their orbits collide, using anecdotes and the odd diversion to climax with all three being caught in the eye of the MainMan management hurricane before it flares up again with Iggy and Bowie producing The Idiot, then peters out.

Source material mixes previously-seen quotes with the author’s own (which could have been more defined). Reed, the Velvets and Nico (who Thompson obviously has a soft spot for) get most detail, Lou probably emerging the most genuinely debauched and vicious of the trio. Iggy is portrayed as the clown programmed to self-destruct until Bowie produces The Idiot, while the latter is the book’s success story; and the MainMan era the most engrossing section. The recycling brings little errors (Bowie was never refused entry to Iggy’s March 1977 comeback gig), but fans of the three will be suitably entertained.

3 stars 3 stars 3 stars

ISBN 7780879309855, 304 pages

Reviewed by Kris Needs
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