The Best And The Worst And The Curse Of Blondie

The sultry, well defined cheek boned face of a young Miss Deborah Harry is probably not difficult to imagine as once the pretty face of a playboy bunny girl. The low but cheeky voice of the female lead of Blondie formed the band with her boyfriend way back in 1974 in New York. After a mixed line up change every so often and a couple of uninteresting singles, they finally hit Britain with ‘Heart Of Glass’ taken from the album ‘Parallel Lines.’

Frank Infante, a guitarist, later rhythm guitarist joined the band in Autumn 1977 after the release of the first Blondie album at Christmas 1976, simply titled, ‘Blondie.’ It was this album that failed to make the charts although a new song featured was ‘Rip Her To Shreds,’ a song that was later made known to growing fans in other albums as well as live sets. Nigel Harrison joined very shortly after Frank in November 1977. It was then that Frank switched to rhythm guitar and Nigel took bass. With Chris Stein, Debbie’s boyfriend on guitar, Clem Burke on drums and Jimmy Destri on keyboards, the line up was complete and there, they stayed until the bands first split in 1982.

A punk outfit at first with a splash of sixties fizzy pink girlie pop, Miss Harry, a severely bleached throw back to the later years of Marilyn Monroe, she was the perfect punk goddess to stand amongst the moppy haired, young suited and booted boys. Surprisingly American, they had always come across severely British. The cover for Parallel Lines, a design thought from their manager, Peter Leeds and photographed by Edo was to Miss Harry’s disgust. She hated the shot and immediately said that it looked flat. It was, however, to become an iconic view of the band. The sharpness of the black and white, bold stripes behind the black suited band and Debbie in a white dress and shoes denoted the new wave feel that the music held within. For 1978, it was design ahead of its time and a style that was soon adapted to the up and coming Ska movement of that time. Blondie, were very much the fore runners for a new type of sound. It is within this album, that the listener can generate the music tastes that were going to happen in the near future. Very much a Blondie album, it experimented with different music genres that were big in the late seventies. The examples of this are, ‘Heart Of Glass’, a fusion of disco and glam to suit the diverse vocals of Harry. ‘Hanging On The Telephone’ is pure Blondie punk, although not their own song, it was originally the product of a band called The Nerves, even so this very immature, sweaty sound of hard thumping, microphone stand shaking new wave might as well have been natural to Blondie as throughout this album, they adapt gracefully to each and every style.

This entirely, timeless classic album is still admired by fellow musicians to day as being one of the most influential and inspiring of the era. Along with its striking sleeve, it contains a small piece about the making of the album and the first meeting with Blondie by album producer Mike Chapman. He recalls in the appraisable and touching account his incredible nervousness on his first encounter with Stein and Harry. Being called in to produce, he had only become a big name from producing glam and glitter rock albums and was not prepared for a futuristic punk rock band with an attitude. He tells of the tensions with the recording, how arguments would occur and yet the genius of the creative writing capabilities between Harrison, Harry and Stein.

With an insight into the stresses of a recording band hard at work and the dramatic force of the cover, we are eager to sample the strengths of the album, and hope not to encounter any weaknesses. We discover there are nine tracks on the album that have been written collaborations between band members. It was an up and fast moving idea to be a songwriter as well as a singer. Since the decade of serial covers that was the sixties, the seventies stole the show by almost everything being original. Having to keep up with the likes of Deep Purple, Led Zep and Clapton who were imaginative to the extreme, a band without the sensitively, multi talented musicians that these other bands had, was a hard job.

Track one, our opening and already mentioned track, ’Hanging On The Telephone,’ starts with a phone ringing and Harry’s vocal quickly enters before the band has a chance to start playing. Mixing sixties style keyboards, it also uses a bridge of Mersey beat drum and cymbal tapping to give a fundamental British edge. A track that was very of the punk generation. Full bodied and mostly untuneful, it involves a lot of fast lyrics. All in all, I feel the need to dig out my winkle pickers and drain pipes rather than don a pink Mohican. This was in itself, the very idea of new wave. For those of you unfamiliar with this fairly dead genre, it literally was a amalgamation of punk and pop It did take on a different form after the age of Blondie and took hold of The Police, but they became so big that they became a music genre all on their own. For this track, it was a definitive introduction to new wave. It had meaningless lyrics, that could never be so deep they could be analysed to any great length. A noise rush of guitars, none actually playing a tune and a lot of lighter than light drums with very little bass. A track that on the whole, could only have any meaning to the listeners who remembered it the first time around. The new wave sound was short lived and eventually breathed it last fast and frantic puff of life around the early to mid eighties by the likes of Duran Duran, but by this time, it had been so commercially watered down, it had become practically unrecognisable. For ’Hanging On The Telephone,’ it took only around five years for this track to sound incredibly dated. Released in mid November 1978, it managed a sturdy number five and stayed around for 12 weeks.

‘One Way Or Another,’ and only recently brought to life again by a slimming advert where we are subjected to a handful of girls trying desperately to get into tight jeans puts me in mind to when this track came out anyway. The advert, it would seem was very close the truth. There were millions of girls and guys fighting and sweating hard to get into the tightest jeans possible without causing internal damage. With its grungy guitar riff and basic drum accompliment, its gives a steady background to the catchy, yet simple lyrics of the song, ’one way or another, I’m gonna get ya, I’m gonna get ya, get, ya, get ya, get ya….’ not too hard to pick up, in fact I think it took only two plays of this record to get the lyrics from beginning to end. Again, a pointless new wave lyric and dull, dirty sound of a repeated riff. Totally devoured of meaning and thought, it was the right kind of sound to keep us twiddling our thumbs whilst the punk era drew to a close and the eighties new romanticism began. It was, if you like the perfect bridge, and with snappy, plain records like this to keep us going, there were very few that were likely to complain.

‘Picture This,’ was a slower, more tuneful track that calmed the pace down on the track and comes as a little light relief. It enlightened us with backing vocals to give it some thought, and speaking of thought, some had actually gone into the lyrics this time. It has a bubble gum theme, all Cindy dolls and seven inch record players on the floor with a stack of records dropping at the end of each. It’s dreamy as far as Blondie could ever dare to be so, but today, it seems flat and un adventurous. Harry’s vocal sounds tired, almost as if she can’t wait to get the track over and done with. Strangely it reached number twelve over here and hang around for eleven weeks. It was Tracey Ullman before Tracey Ullman started making records…

‘Fade Away And Radiate’ was written by Harry’s other half, Chris Stein. We wonder what on Earth had been on television or put in his tea when he wrote this. With its opening more morgues and depressing than a Celine Dion B side, it reminds me of ‘Stereotype’ by The Specials, which had not been their finest moment. Like Joan Of Arc being led to the stake, it punctures our ear drums with military drums before we feel the urge to turn it off, Harry’s voice sounds like it has had surgery, it comes across as soft and unconvincing. Stein, possibly has a crack at a guitar solo, but thankfully that fades away very quickly. With misbeated drums and wobbly backing, we really rather hope that this track would fade away soon. Robert Fripp guests on this track playing guitar.
We wonder, actually what this genre this was aiming for at the time of writing. It is quite depressing, and even the touch of early UB40 reggae doesn’t do enough to lift this track from bad to reasonably better.

The up-tempo and barely optimistic jangle of the guitars at the beginning of ‘Pretty Baby’ is welcomed after the previous. Again, it struggles to fit into a them when the first two tracks were so strong and able of creating their own cult. This album falls by the way side somewhat. Harry tries her hand at the old style of all girl, sixties Motown where the lead talks a lyric and the backing singers sing it back rather like a Supremes style. This feature is warmly received by the listener, but all we crave for now is the same sit up and listen anthems of the beginning of the album.

‘I Know But I Don’t Know,’ Is a vocal collaboration between Harry and one of the guys. It is limp to say the least. Both voices, one singing, one talking each verse, it is pure, authentic new wave, I can bet you that, but I feel that this style of boy/girl pop punk lyric was better done by the one hit wonders of the time. There doesn’t seem much to be said about this track. Perhaps the title should say it better than me, for the style and the content of music from within, I should just say, ‘I know, but I don’t know…’ Perhaps it’s the howling dog moment by Harry plus another that probably knocked it off the turntable for me..

‘11.59,’ is the one and only title for this next track, albeit, numerical. Very rocky and nearer to punk in its opening that the rest of the album. It is dominated in verse by keyboards. The lyrics are clear and reminding me of that timeless classic…’you’ll always find me in the kitchen at parties….’ Blondie, it has to be said, brought us legends of new wave. They were gods (and a goddess) in their own right for a handful of classic pieces of music that will follow one generation to the next, but I feel that the majority, and I will include this highly acclaimed album, was pretty much flat. For a piece of new wave history in our British music industry, it was uneventful, thankfully this is something else we can blame the Americans for…

‘Will Anything Happen,’ perhaps starts to pick the album and attempt to put it back on its feet again. With a guitar riff not sounding unlike a ripping machine gun, it has punch where the other tracks appeared less than average. Once more we are back to straining our ears for lyrics. It was seem that we have to for go something for the appearance of something else. We lose the lyrics and the music sounds better. This feels although the band have been asleep for the duration so far and suddenly someone has given them a punch (I think I’ve said that about another album before!) It finishes before we have had a any time to get into it…

‘Sunday Girl,’ is one of those tracks that we know and love. Remember me mentioning that Blondie had a handful of classics? Well, this is one of them. It was this track that went straight to number one over here and stayed thirteen weeks in the chart. Jolly, with a pretty drum beat, this is hardly fault able. It has a touch of hand clapping at a off count beat. It is still flat, but tuneful and pleasant to listen to. Harry had such a versatile voice, she sings with a soft, interesting, pink fluffy voice. A track that would probably get on ones nerves after too many plays, but the whole point of new wave was that it didn’t require any real musicians of any intelligence. Because punk had been generated by the media for kids to get into easily, in the same vein, new wave had done the same thing, except tone punk down a little and make it sound more acceptable. As with this track, the acceptance is there only the irritation of your mother turning this up on the radio was this tracks only down fall.

‘Heart Of Glass.’ Was and still is a disco favourite and will be played somewhere, somehow at a middle aged, drunken party where bank managers dance with their thumbs in the air and wear streamers around their necks anywhere in the world at any time of the day. With is indication of Rod ‘Do you think I’m Sexy’ drums and twinkle of Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love.’ Harry was at her sultry, new age Monroe best. On Top Of The Tops, she looked drugged up (and probably was) her eyes sat heavily on those fantastic cheekbones and the whole band came alive with this track. It epitomised the rock glam, glitzy, disco and anything you like mix of everything that could get you up on your feet. Perhaps my only grip is that the ‘nah nah nah’s’ went on too long at the end…This record went straight to number one in the UK charts in Jan 1979. It was re issued in July 1995, but failed to go any higher than number 15.

Those of a certain age, will recognise this next track and be surprised at this track actually working for a band like Blondie. Originally a song written for Buddy Holly and also recorded by him (it wasn’t a hit, but a track that would crop up from time to time on compilation albums), ‘I’m Gonna Love You Too,’ includes the Hollyisms usually found in his records. The first feature of this is the group ‘ha, ha, ha, ha ,ha, ha, ha, ha’s’ which is probably a touching tribute from Blondie to the man himself. She tries a little to style the short, quipped lyrics that was Holly. It’s a fun track, not to be taken too seriously. Lots of jumping up and down on the spot very quickly wouldn’t go a miss when listening to this record. A fairly passable new wave twist to a B side rock and roll song.

‘Just Go Away,’ written by Harry alone, its rather middle of the road. Lacking in all that is Blondie, it features the most appalling backing vocals echoing the lead in the chorus. The guys play at being an imitation of The Young Ones backing Cliff, on ‘Living Doll.’ it’s a pretty flat song that probably didn’t deserve a place on this album. What must be remembered here, that despite the fair pieces of rubbish on this album, this had been marked down in history as a cult album. Simply because it was the epitome of new wave music. Albeit, a very quick wave…perhaps a microwave? Bad joke…

The digitally remastered album on compact disc features four bonus tracks, (my heart sank.) The first is titled ‘Once I Had A Love (aka The Disco Song)’ 1978 version, but those with half a brain cell will recognise it as ‘Heart Of Glass.’ Recorded, according the sleeve note, on the 6th of March 1978 at The Record Plant in New York. Unfortunately, the main thing that listening to this track does is hurl towards the listener that Blondie were lousy at performing life. Particularly a track as this which requires the keyboards, the backing vocals and all the other trimmings to create the full, in your face disco record that it was supposed to be. This terrible live recording is a basic, jingly guitar and drum version without the sparkle. Skip it, its not a version of a classic discotheque track, its something less than that.

‘Bang A Gong (Get It On) was enough for me to turn off the CD and forget the whole thing. I am a passionate follower of Marc Bolan. I was that generation and we looked up to Bolan as some sort of glitter God. However, Blondie’s messy version of this Bolan classic is criminal. I was shocked, actually to hear this on the album. ‘Parallel Lines’ was a historic moment, we understand that. What I don’t understand is the want and the need to sling on a handful of dire tracks on the tail end of it to justify its remastering. This track was recorded on the 11th of April 1978 in Boston. Blondie gave this song a grunge theme and far too much thrash that I feel the song never deserved in the first place. The track goes on for too long and the vocals of Harry that don’t sound sober come across as amateur and un rehearsed.

Yet another live track follows. Recorded at the Walnut Theatre, PA. This time we hear, ‘I Know But I Don’t Know,’ which, even a little credit here, doesn’t sound too bad. I feel the mark of a good track and a good band is to see if they can produce a record live, that is the perfect copy of the studio version. This track, that sounded durgy in the studio, has been given some extra guitar thrashing here and from what I can pick out, Rick Wakeman has sneaked some keyboards in at the back….but I guess he probably had better things to do that day. A track inexcusably thrown against the wall to see if it would bounce off the audience, it sounds just as bad as the studio version…

‘Hanging On The Telephone,’ sounds even better. I feel that with these last four tracks, they are a journey through the life of Blondie live and that the last track is when they got it right. The vocals, it has to be said re fairly easy, in pitch and note, to be repeated perfectly on stage. New wave lyrics never needed a good strong singing voice, a lot of it was shouted anyhow, so this track is passable without surgery.

That was new wave, a musical stage that passed a lot of us by. Actually what was happening to music after new wave was far more intriguing. It is surprising to learn that Blondie were one of a handful of bands in the world who created so many number ones in such a short space of time. Between Jan 1979 and November 1980, they racked up five in total. Their last number one was with ‘Maria’ in February 1999 after reforming the band in 1998. A long string of compilation albums were churned out every so often between 1982 and 2003 with also ‘No Exit’ and ‘The Curse Of Blondie.

Although we’ve yet to see anything from the band in the 21st century, we can be safe in the knowledge that we will always have the late seventies new wave movement to fall back on. It is ironic actually, that the historic Blondie and leader of all that came after them, have grown both musically and performance wise in recent years.


Perhaps the very curse of Blondie was new wave….



Bought at Music Zone around five pounds Feb 2006.
©M. Duffy (sam1942 2006)