ADRIAN THRILLS: No stage dives, no rolling in broken glass – but Iggy’s still rocking at 75

IGGY POP: Every Loser (Atlantic)

Verdict: Iggy returns to his roots

Qualification: ***

DAVID CROSBY & THE LIGHTHOUSE BAND: Live at the Capitol Theater (BMG)

Verdict: Awesome Harmonies

Classification: ****

TAKEN FOR TREES: Another Year (Rough Trade)

Verdict: Timely tribute

Qualification: ***

When Iggy Pop released his album Post Pop Depression in 2016, there were suggestions that it might be his last. . . or at least the last time he made a full-bodied rock and roll record. After all, the former savage had become a respectable older statesman who played golf, watched Countryfile, and sold car insurance on television.

We should have known better. At 75, Iggy is no longer diving on stage, rolling over broken glass or slathering himself in peanut butter, as he did when he fronted his old band, the Stooges, at a Cincinnati concert in 1970, but he still he knows how to handle himself in a powerhouse. rock song and there are a lot of them on his 19th solo LP.

The singer, born James Osterberg and raised in a Michigan trailer park, made a name for himself playing hard rock before flying to Berlin to record his adventurous solo LPs, The Idiot and Lust For Life, with David Bowie. “I’m the shirtless guy who rocks, and we made a record the old-fashioned way,” he says, of this new offering. Well, that’s only partially true.

Every Loser suffers from no shortage of fast and furious beats, featuring the Pop studio band featuring Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan and Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith. But producer Andrew Watt, whose resume stretches from Justin Bieber to Ozzy Osbourne, brings a modern glitz to the table.

Iggy can still play the oldest punk on the block with wide eyes. He rages against the evils of the music business in Modern Day Rip Off, and he delivers a satirical jab at today’s rebel rock scholars in Neo Punk.

Frenzy is an angry response to being bullied online. . . though a chorus that drops the F-bomb is not for the faint of heart.

If there’s a generic feel to some of the faster rock numbers (the shrill climate change anthem All The Way Down, for example), Every Loser also allows Iggy to explore his reflective side. Anyone who has tuned in to his excellent weekly BBC Radio 6 Music program will know how much he loves new sounds and his appetite for the unexpected is on full display here.

Sung in a deep, Sinatra-esque baritone (and surprisingly tuneful), the Morning Show ballad is the tale of a burnt-out celebrity preparing for a round of talk show appearances. Elsewhere, New Atlantis is a love letter to her adopted hometown of Miami, and Strung Out Johnny is a cautionary tale about the ills of heroin. “It’s wiser to say no,” he says of a steamy addiction he thankfully kicked in the 1980s.

With its 11 new songs running in 37 minutes, this is a focused return of one of rock’s most celebrated figures. A quieter lifestyle certainly hasn’t weakened his artistic edge.

Another of music’s great survivors is enjoying a belated renaissance. As a founding member of two hotheaded bands, The Byrds and Crosby, Stills & Nash, david crosby he was a pivotal presence in the hippy counterculture that flourished in Los Angeles’ Laurel Canyon.

Now 81 years old and recovered from heart surgery in 2014, he refuses to play it safe. Not many musicians in their fall years would start a new group with ‘three weirdos,’ but he retains a refreshingly positive attitude, and has been writing elegant, melodic songs with The Lighthouse Band since 2016.

A tight-knit quartet with the same masculine-feminine balance as Abba, Crosby’s new Lighthouse family augments their singing and acoustic guitar playing with bassist Michael League, keyboardist Michelle Willis and jazz guitarist Becca Stevens.

The first time Crosby met the latter, he told him, “You’re really weird, we should make music together.” How could he resist?

Their latest release, a live CD and DVD recorded in a theater in the New York suburbs, is truly collaborative, with all four band members trading off smooth harmonies and lead lines. The onus is on the recent material, but some Crosby classics are given new life, too.

Among the standards to air are 1969’s Guinnevere, dedicated to Crosby’s wife, Jan, and the following year’s Déjà Vu, extended to ten minutes with an electric piano solo true to Willis’s era.

There’s even a sunny Woodstock cover by Joni Mitchell that reiterates Crosby’s desire to continue looking on the bright side.

There must be something in the Stockholm water that draws Swedish women to the female singer-songwriters who broke through in the 1960s and 1970s. Four years ago, First Aid Kit did Who By Fire, a tribute to Leonard Cohen.

Now, indie-pop vocalist Victoria Bergsman, aka Taken By Trees, has created Another Year, a mini-album of Colin Blunstone covers.

Blunstone, lead singer of The Zombies, has been described by Neil Tennant as “the missing link between Dusty Springfield and Nick Drake,” and Bergsman adds a lush, mellow edge to his 1972 solo hit Say You Don’t Mind.

He also covers Caroline Goodbye, a breakup song written for his ex-lover (and ex-Bond girl) Caroline Munro.

With the 77-year-old Blunstone and his original bandmate Rod Argent working on a new Zombies album, it’s a timely reminder of his legacy.

Iggy Pop performs at Crystal Palace Park, London, on July 1 (ticketmaster.co.uk).