Iggy Pop Releasing 7 Track Spoken Word & Electronica Ep

This feels like it's come out of nowhere – it turns out that His Iggyness has recorded an EP of Walt Whitman's poetry, set to headfried electronica produced by Tarwater and alva noto. The 7 track project, titled Leaves of Grass is dropping on February 5th – so, this week basically – and from what we've heard it sounds pretty good, Iggy's voice perfectly suited to delivering Whitman's sexually charged words.

Here's Iggy on Whitman:

"You know, I think he had something like Elvis. Like Elvis ahead of his time, one of the first manic American populists. You know you're looking at pictures of him, and he was obviously someone who was very much involved with his own physical appearance. His poetry is always about motion and rushing ahead, and crazy love and blood pushing through the body. He would have been the perfect gangster rapper. Whitman says, even the most beautiful face is not as beautiful as the body. And to say that in the middle of the 19th century is outrageous. It's a slap in the face. Look at the popular, well-educated poets of the time, those sensitive noblemen. But Whitman writes: "Fuck ass."

There are no sound clips around anywhere yet; we're working on it…