Photos by Dan Grunebaum

James Newell Osterberg, Jr. likes to do things twice. No, make that repeatedly. Better known by his stage name, Iggy Pop, the storied rocker in his third Fuji Rock appearance (and first with the Stooges) performed his best-known song “I Wanna Be Your Dog” not once, but in an encore a second time. In his set before Saturday’s sellout crowd of 40,000 at Naeba Ski Resort, Pop also repeated another of his well-tested provocations, inciting the audience to rush the stage but this time got perhaps more than he was bargaining for.

Pop first descended to mingle with the audience and then—mistaken for a fan—was momentarily prevented from returning to the stage. After next falling off the stage as he chased the microphone and returning with a visible limp, the 60-year-old American rock icon urged security to “let them up.” Dozens of frenzied festivalgoers immediately jumped the barrier and rushed to join Pop on stage. In a matter of seconds, a crowd of hundreds was swarming the “Iguana” as beefy security guards shielded him from overexcited punters. Although Pop tried to continue singing “No Fun,” at one point an unidentified fan had taken over the microphone and was screaming to the crowd, forcing the band to stop playing.

It looked briefly as if promoter Smash was going to have to end the Stooges’ set prematurely, but security gradually restored control, ushering people off the stage as a slightly shaken Pop repeated “Thank You. Goodbye. Go down easy.”

After that melee, anything the Beastie Boys did would have been anticlimactic. But they soldiered on stage and reeled off a string of hits like “Can’t, Don’t, Won’t Stop,” before kicking out jams from their new record, The Instrumental Album.

In a festival that began Thursday night with a party for 15,000 and didn’t wind up until the early hours of Monday morning, Iggy Pop’s near-riot was the only edgy moment in an otherwise flawlessly run event.

Historic moments of the 11th Fuji Rock Festival included the Cure’s first set in Japan in 23 years and an appearance by 1960s soul diva Marva Whitney. For once, the heavens mostly held back, with only two brief spells of rain failing to dampen the spirits of the total audience of 127,000, slightly down from last year’s 131,000. Dance acts including the Chemical Brothers and Justice provided competent sets, but the most exhilarating performances came from bands playing more organic music. Groups ranging from England’s Kaiser Chiefs to Spain’s Fermin Muguruza to Japan’s Soul Flower Union made primal connections with a crowd that’s made founder Masa Hidaka’s Fuji Rock Festival an essential part of the summer experience, guaranteeing it will be around for decades to come.

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