"I Got Nothin'" (Iggy Pop & James Williamson)

In a previous entry about a fantastic cover of "No Sense of Crime" by Van Hunt, I discussed Iggy Pop & James Williamson's album Kill City (1977).  To briefly recap, Kill City is an album consisting of a bunch of demo tracks that Pop and Williamson had recorded together in 1975 after the dissolution of The Stooges.  The demos were cut in hopes of landing a new record deal.  But with all of the drug-fueled turmoil surrounding Pop, no record labels could be convinced to gamble on the duo.  So the tapes sat for almost 2 years until Pop made a comeback with David Bowie's help, and then to capitalize on his new popularity, Kill City was hastily released by indie label Bomp! Records.  
Thing is, the songwriting and Pop's performance were excellent on Kill City; the sound quality, not so much.  I heard a copy of Kill City in college, circa 1999, and it was a muddy mess.  It sounded like someone with a cheap tape recorder and even cheaper microphone had snuck into the studio to capture the band warming up.  It drove the audiophile in me crazy.  But, then again, it felt a little like having some exclusive glimpse into Pop's creative process—like a bootleg tape from your friend's cousin's neighbor who got it from his girlfriend's brother's coworker, who used to be a roadie for Iggy back in the 70s.  Or something.
Anyway, there's a song sitting in the middle of side one called "I Got Nothin'" that I instantly loved the moment I heard it.  In it, melancholy verses alternate with blistering choruses, where Pop screams I got nothin'! over a devastating riff.  We're talking primal, Arthur Janov catharsis.  It's frightening and exhilarating, all at once.
In short, it's a song about Pop's state of mind in 1975.  He had checked himself into a mental institution to try to kick his heroin habit, and he felt like he'd hit bottom.  Basically, he's saying that pleasures of the flesh don't even hold any interest for him anymore; he's a shell of his former self.
To put it another way, this is not the "million in prizes" Iggy that would celebrate a "Lust for Life" a few years later; this is an artist at the nadir of his life, and he's not hiding it.  It's that raw, unvarnished truth that draws me to this track.
Thankfully, Williamson went back into the studio in 2010 and remastered the entire album so that it sounds as fresh and spry as if it were recorded yesterday.  Every dull edge is now sharpened to spiky (im)perfection, making the album an even more worthy successor to 1973's Raw Power.