Slash, Andrew Watt trade solos, channel their inner punk onstage with Iggy Pop in revved-up take on The Stooges' I Wanna Be Your Dog
Slash's Guns N' Roses bandmate, Duff McKagan, and Chad Smith were also on hand to serve as the rhythm section for the all-star performance at the Hollywood Palladium last week
When people discuss age-defying frontmen, usually the first name to come up (deservedly so) is Mick Jagger.
Shout out to Iggy Pop, though, who – at the ripe age of 76 – is still prancing shirtless on stages across the world, bringing the many ne'er-do-well anthems he's recorded on his own and with proto-punk legends the Stooges to rapturous audiences.
During one such show – held last Thursday (April 27) at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles – Pop invited Guns N' Roses electric guitar legend Slash and bass guitar player Duff McKagan to the stage to assist him with a supercharged version of I Wanna Be Your Dog, the proto-punk classic Pop recorded with the Stooges in 1969.
You can see fan-filmed footage of the performance below.
Also onstage with Pop that evening was Andrew Watt, the super-producer who manned the boards on Ozzy Osbourne's 2020 LP, Ordinary Man, and its Grammy-winning 2022 follow-up, Patient Number 9.
Watt also produced and played guitar on Pop's 2023 album, Every Loser, and has played with the legendary frontman as part of his most-recent all-star backing band, The Losers.
With that in mind, Slash humbly lets Watt take the first solo – which Watt, Gibson Les Paul in hand, does with aplomb – before burning one of his own a few minutes later.
Get The Pick Newsletter
All the latest guitar news, interviews, lessons, reviews, deals and more, direct to your inbox!
Mind you, this was far from Slash and Watt's first meeting. Watt's band, California Breed, opened for Slash featuring Myles Kennedy & the Conspirators on the latter's 2014 UK tour, and the two met again during the sessions for Ordinary Man, on which Slash guested.
“Working with Andrew [on Ordinary Man] was great," Slash told Guitar World in a 2020 interview. "He has a really youthful approach and great energy. And as a guitar player he’s not trying to be a Zakk [Wylde] or a Gus [G] or any of those guys. He has his own thing. He’s definitely somebody to watch out for.”
This wasn't Slash's first recent onstage guest solo, either. Just a month ago, the top-hatted guitar god got his Jimmy Page on in a fiery onstage guest spot with hard-rockers Dorothy at LA's Troubadour.
Thank you for reading 5 articles this month**
Join now for unlimited access
US pricing $3.99 per month or $39.00 per year
UK pricing £2.99 per month or £29.00 per year
Europe pricing €3.49 per month or €34.00 per year
*Read 5 free articles per month without a subscription
Jackson is an Associate Editor at GuitarWorld.com. He’s been writing and editing stories about new gear, technique and guitar-driven music both old and new since 2014, and has also written extensively on the same topics for Guitar Player. Elsewhere, his album reviews and essays have appeared in Louder and Unrecorded. Though open to music of all kinds, his greatest love has always been indie, and everything that falls under its massive umbrella. To that end, you can find him on Twitter crowing about whatever great new guitar band you need to drop everything to hear right now.
“I was approached to join David Lee Roth’s band, initially… I didn’t want to be Eddie Van Halen part two”: Steve Stevens on laying down the Dirty Diana solo with Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones, recording Rebel Yell – and why Vai got it right with Roth
“There was a time you wouldn’t have touched a Superstrat, at least in my world – that was very illegal. It’s cool to be able to let go of those old feelings and those silly rules”: How Chris Shiflett learned to love his inner shredder