“Lust for Life” by Iggy Pop

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My pick for the best classic rock party track ever recorded, fueled by an indefatigable force nature in punk rock.

Name someone who performs with more of a lust for life than Mr. Iggy Pop.

Go ahead. Think about it. Go through your mental Rolodex of rock royalty. Do a Google or streaming playlist search if you like. I’ll wait.

Did you find anyone? Neither did I.

You can see it in clips from recent-ish live shows, like this one from Austin City Limits or this one from the Royal Albert Hall. He doesn’t walk out on stage and grab the microphone. He struts with the boundless energy of someone half his age. Maybe someone who hadn’t endured multiple lifetimes’ worth of wear and tear from touring like he has. He stands shirtless under a tuxedo jacket, preening and gesturing at the crowd, giving them a moment to soak it all in. It’s really happening. This legend himself is standing before them in all his defiant glory, and he’s going to make the most of this and every other moment like it on stage. To watch him shimmy and shout his way through this classic is to be in the presence of true greatness.

“Lust For Life,” the most enduring cut of Iggy’s 1977 album of the same name, came after a relative instability in the singer’s life. The Stooges had broken up for the second time in their history, and in the ensuing months, his drug use escalated to unprecedented proportions. He checked himself into a psychiatric institute and tried to get his life back on track. His close friend and collaborator, David Bowie, then took him out on the Station to Stationsupporting tour before heading to Berlin and throwing himself into the eponymous period of his recording career. During that explosion of creativity, Bowie co-wrote “Lust for Life” on a ukelele of all things, supposedly while he was waiting on an episode of Starsky and Hutch. Pop later said Bowie “resurrected” a career he thought was dead in the water.

The rest, as they say, is history—one that includes multiple rediscoveries and reappraisals in pop culture, such as its inclusion in the wildly popular soundtrack to the film Trainspotting. The drum beat, originally performed by Hunt Sales, has been ripped off countless times in the years since by groups like Jet. It’s not like it’s unique, either. It’s a rock interpretation of the Motown groove that runs through songs like the Supremes’ “You Can’t Hurry Love.” But, as the backbone for the ultimate example of punk rock meets jangle pop, it set the standard for many records that would come after it.

At the time of his writing, Iggy Pop is 77 years old and one year removed from his 19th studio album, Every Loser. It was a good-but-not-great record, certainly not peak Iggy, but another testament, like this track, for that indefatigable spirit that will be his calling card forever.