Iggy Pop was 'really surprised' when he got the call from the Recording Academy to confirm he would be receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s Grammy Awards.
The 72-year-old punk legend will be honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual awards ceremony on Sunday (26.01.20), but after being in the industry for 50 years and never once winning a Grammy, Iggy has admitted he was shocked when he finally got the call.
He said: “[I was] really surprised. I said, ‘I’m not talking to them!’ It’s been, what? 50 years? No Grammy! But they said, ‘You won.’ And I said, ‘Well, is there anything I have to do? Is it contingent on anything?’ And they said, ‘No. It can never be changed.’ So I thought that was okay. That was nice.”
The former Stooges frontman has been nominated for a Grammy twice but this will be the first time he has walked away with a trophy at the end of the night.
And although he’s received accolades before - such as being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame along with his Stooges bandmates in 2010 - Iggy believes winning the approval of the Recording Academy has proven “tougher”.
Speaking to People magazine, he said: “[The Grammy’s are] a tougher can of tuna to pry open.
“I suppose I kind of feel as if the Academy and I met halfway, something like that. It’s sort of like a problem has been eliminated, put it that way … These things have been happening in my career for the last 10 years or so.
“At first it was almost grim. Like, ‘Okay, I got there, I got that. It doesn’t make ‘Raw Power’ any better or any worse.’ But after a while I came to appreciate that every person has a point of view. It took me a long time to appreciate that a lot of people have points of view that are nothing like mine whatsoever, but I need to respect them. Whereas when I was 25, it was like, ‘Agree with me or death.’ ”
