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Debbie Harry

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Debbie Harry

Deborah Ann Harry (born July 1, 1945, in Miami, Florida) is most famous for being the frontwoman for the Punk rock/new wave band Blondie. She is a Grammy Award-winning, and Golden Globe-nominated American singer. Following her success, she went on to moderate success as a solo artist.

Life and Early Career

Harry was adopted at three months of age by a family from Hawthorne, New Jersey and attended Hawthorne High School, where she graduated in 1963.[1] Prior to starting her singing career she moved to New York in the late 60's and worked as a secretary at the BBC Radio New York office for one year. Later, she was a waitress, a dancer in Union City, and a Playboy Bunny.[2]

She began her musical career with a folk rock group, the Wind in the Willows. Harry then joined a girl-group trio, The Stilettos, in the early 1970s. The Stilettos' backup band included her eventual boyfriend and Blondie guitarist, Chris Stein. Harry and Stein formed the band Blondie in the mid 1970s, naming it for the wolf whistle men often yelled at Harry from passing cars. Blondie quickly became regulars at Max's Kansas City and CBGB's in New York City. After a debut album in 1976, commercial success followed in the late 1970s and early 1980s, first in Australia and Europe, then in the United States.

Blondie

With her two-tone bottle-blonde hair, Debbie Harry quickly became a recognizable icon of punk style. Her look was further popularized by the band's early presence in the music video revolution of the era. The clip for 'Rapture' appeared within the first 24 hours of MTV's launch. Harry's strong stage persona of cool sexuality and streetwise style became so closely associated with the group's name that many came to believe the singer's name to be "Blondie". The difference between the individual Harry and the band Blondie was famously highlighted with a "Blondie is a Group" button campaign by the band in 1979. [3] To complicate matters further, Harry sometimes described her character in the band as being named "Blondie", as in this quote from the No Exit tour book:

Hi, it's Deb. You know, when I woke up this morning I had a realization about myself. I was always Blondie. People always called me Blondie, ever since I was a little kid. What I realized is that at some point I became Dirty Harry. I couldn't be Blondie anymore, so I became Dirty Harry.[4]

Through 1976 and 1977, Blondie released their first two LPs to a little success outside the US. However, with their third LP, Parallel Lines in 1978 shot the group to huge international success, mainly through the single Heart of Glass. Several other singles followed from the album as did the release of Eat to the Beat in 1979 and Autoamerican in 1980. Along the way came several more important singles of the band's career, including Atomic, The Tide Is High, Rapture and a non LP, #1 single Call Me.

Harry performing in July 1981.

In 1982 Blondie regrouped and released their sixth studio album The Hunter, which featured the U.S. and UK hit single 'Island of Lost Souls' and the minor UK hit 'War Child'. Blondie launched a North American tour to support the release, however, this was cut short when Harry's lover, guitarist Chris Stein, fell ill with the rare genetic disease pemphigus. Immediately afterwards, the band called it quits and announced their split.

The mid 90s saw the release of Blondie remix albums Beautiful (in Europe) and Remixed Remade Remodeled (in the U.S.). New mixes of 'Heart of Glass', 'Atomic', and 'Union City Blue' were released as singles and all made the UK Top 40, while remixes of 'Atomic', 'Rapture', and 'Heart of Glass' had major success on the U.S. dance charts. Then in 1997 Blondie began working together again for the first time in 15 years. Two tracks recorded with TV. Mania (the production duo of Duran Duran members Nick Rhodes and Warren Cuccurullo), 'Studio 54' and 'Pop Trash Movie' were scheduled to be released on a Blondie compilation entitled This Is Blondie. However, the project and the tracks were shelved as the four original members (Harry, Stein, Burke and Destri) embarked on sessions for what would become Blondie's seventh studio album. During this period they released a cover of Iggy Pop's 'Ordinary Bummer' on the Pop tribute album We Will Fall (1997).

After a final tour of Europe with The Jazz Passengers in the summer of 1998, Deborah Harry resumed duties as lead vocalist of Blondie. Prior to the release of No Exit the band completed a rapturously received sell out tour of Europe. Dates at London's Lyceum Theatre were recorded by the BBC and aired on national BBC Radio 1. A week prior to the release of No Exit, the lead single 'Maria' debuted at number one in the UK, making Harry the oldest female singer to reach No. 1 in the UK, a record she still holds. 'Maria' hit #1 in 14 different countries, the top 10 on the US Dance Charts, and Top 15 on the US Adult Top 40 Charts. The album No Exit debuted at No.3 in the UK and #17 in the US, where it is very close to gold certification, and Blondie announced dates for a major Arena tour that summer during which they played the Glastonbury Festival and Party in the Park in London. 'Nothing Is Real but the Girl' was another UK Top 30 hit, while the title track was released as a single to coincide with further arena dates in November that year.

Harry entered the Guinness World Book of Records in 1999 as the "Oldest Female Singer to Reach No. 1 in the UK Chart" when Blondie went to number one with "Maria" on February 13, 1999 at the age of 53 years and 227 days.[5]

Tracks culled from dates throughout the 1999 world tour were released as a live album, titled Live in the U.S. and Livid in the UK, and released in late 1999 and early 2000 respectively. A Blondie Live companion DVD was also released, recorded at a show in NYC Town Hall.

Although Blondie commenced recording tracks for the follow-up to No Exit in 2001 the sessions were besieged with problems including the loss of master tapes after 9/11. In the winter of 2002 Blondie burst back into life with a full scale UK tour. This preceded the release of a new single in summer of 2003 entitled 'Good Boys' (a hit across the UK and Europe that autumn, and top 10 on the US Dance Charts the following spring) and the release of Blondie's eighth studio album, the critically acclaimed The Curse of Blondie. Blondie toured throughout 2003 and 2004 completing two further full scale tours of the UK.

Harry performing in December 2005.

A second live album, entitled Live By Request, was released in 2005 along with a companion DVD set. 2005 saw the release of a dual disk CD/DVD of The Curse of Blondie and a mash-up, 'Rapture Riders', which combined their 1981 hit 'Rapture' with The Doors' 'Riders on the Storm'. This track was taken from a Blondie Greatest Hits compilation entitled Sound and Vision - released with a companion DVD disk and new mixes of In The Flesh and Good Boys.

In the winter of 2005 Blondie toured the UK for the fourth time in as many years. In 2006 they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Around this time Blondie released a new studio track, a cover of the Roxy Music song 'More Than This' to promote their "Road Rage" tour.

At the end of 2006 a new mix of Heart of Glass became a big club hit in Europe (rumours of another remix album persist) while Deborah Harry released the single New York New York a collaboration with Moby. The song debuted on youtube some four weeks before its official release.

In June 2007, Harry delineated the different personas (Blondie the band, her role in the band, and Deborah Harry the singer) in an interview which asked why she played only solo music on the 2007 True Colors Tour: "I've put together a new trio with no Blondie members in it - I really want to make a clear definition between Debbie's solo projects and Blondie - and I hope that the audience can appreciate that and also appreciate this other material." [6]

Solo Albums

Harry began her solo career with the album Koo Koo in 1981. The album peaked at a dismal #28 in the US and #6 in the UK. 'Backfired', the first single from the album, had a video directed by H.R. Giger and climbed to a disappointing 43 on the Billboard Hot 100, #29 on the Hot Dance Club Play and #32 on the UK Singles Chart. 'The Jam Was Moving' was lifted as the second single and peaked at #82 in the US as well as failing to chart in the UK.

In 1986, Harry released her second solo album Rockbird, which peaked at #97 in the US and #32 in the UK. The single 'French Kissin' in the USA' brought her into the UK top 10 singles chart and became a moderate US hit. Other singles released from the album were 'Free to Fall' and 'In Love With Love' which hit #1 on the U.S. Dance Charts and was released with several remixes.

Her next solo venture was the album Def, Dumb and Blonde in 1989. At this point Harry reverted from "Debbie" to "Deborah" for her professional name. The first single 'I Want That Man' was a big hit in Europe, Australia, and on the U.S. Modern Rock Charts. The success propelled the album to #12 on the UK charts. However, the US was less receptive and it peaked at #123. She followed this up with the ballad 'Brite Side' and the club hit 'Sweet and Low'. 'Maybe For Sure', a track originally recorded by Blondie for the Rock and Rule animated film, was the fourth single released from the album in June 1990 to coincide with a UK tour. 'Kiss It Better' was also a Top 15 Modern Rock single in the U.S.

During the period 1989 to 1991 Deborah toured extensively across the world with former Blondie guitarist Chris Stein, Underworld's Karl Hyde, and Blondie Mk2 bassist Leigh Foxx. In July 1991 she played Wembley Stadium with INXS. In 1991 Chrysalis released a "best of" compilation in Europe entitled The Complete Picture: The Very Best of Deborah Harry and Blondie, containing hits with Blondie as well as solo hits. The collection reached #3 in the UK album charts. The album also included her duet with Iggy Pop on the Cole Porter song 'Well Did You Evah!' from the Red Hot and Blue AIDS charity album released at the end of 1990.

Deborah Harry's fourth solo album Debravation appeared in July 1993. The album's first single was the Baker produced 'I Can See Clearly' which peaked in the UK at #23 and #2 on the U.S. dance charts. This was followed by 'Strike Me Pink' in September. Controversy surrounded the latter track's drowning man video, which was banned and subsequent record company promo cancelled. U.S. editions of the album feature two additional tracks recorded with pre-recorded music by REM: 'Tear Drops' and 'My Last Date (With You)'.

In November 1993 Deborah Harry toured the UK with Chris Stein, Peter Min, Greta Brinkman and James Murphy. The set list of the Debravation Tour featured an offbeat selection of Harry material including the previously unreleased track 'Close Your Eyes' (from 1989) and 'Ordinary Bummer' (from the Stein produced Iggy Pop album Zombie Birdhouse; a track which under the moniker 'Adolph's Dog' Blondie would cover in 1997). Tentative plans to record these shows and release them as a double live CD never came to fruition. However, a cover of The Rolling Stones 'Wild Horses' is available as a bootleg. At the end of 1993 Chrysalis released the Blondie rarities collection Blonde and Beyond, which featured the previously unreleased tracks 'Scenery' and 'Underground Girl'. In early 1994 Harry took the Debravation tour to the U.S.

In 2006 Deborah Harry started work in NYC on tracks for her fifth solo album 'Necessary Evil' (2007). Working with production duo Super Buddha (who produced the remix of Blondie's 'In The Flesh' for the 2005 Sound and Vision compilation) the first music to surface in was a hip-hop track entitled 'Dirty and Deep' in which she spoke out against rapper Lil' Kim's incarceration. The song is available for download on the web-site www.deborahharry.com.

Throughout 2006 a number of new tracks surfaced (but then disappeared) from Harry's MySpace page, including 'Charm Alarm', 'Deep End', 'Love With Avengence', 'School for Scandal' and 'Necessary Evil' as well as duets she recorded with Miss Guy (of Toilet Boys fame). These were 'God Save New York' and 'New York Groove'. It is unclear whether these tracks were finished versions of the tracks that will appear on the new record. However, the tracks are marked by a definite shift towards a more dance infected electro-rock style. A streaming version of the lead single 'Two Times Blue' was added to Harry's My Space page in May 2007. On June 6th, 2007, an iTunes downloadable version was released via her official web site, www.deborahharry.com.

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Harry performing in June 2007.

Harry joined Cyndi Lauper's True Colors Tour 2007 for the Human Rights Campaign. She is a strong advocate for Gay Rights and Gay Marriage. Though she has stated that she identifies as mostly heterosexual, Harry has said she has had intimate relationships with both men and women. [7][8]

The final track listing for the album has now been issued, citing 17 tracks to make the final cut. The new album will be released on Eleven Seven Music on August 7, 2007 (US only) by which time she will have completed both a solo tour of the US in June and an European tour with Blondie in July. The Album gets a UK release in September. An unusual move considering Harry is more popular in the UK than the US (according to chart positions) The street date for the album has been changed to September 25th so Debbie could work on other projects like her Blondie European Tour.

Other Various Musical Projects

In 1983 Harry teamed up with Giorgio Moroder (with whom she had worked previously on Blondie's 'Call Me') on the song 'Rush Rush', which was featured in the film Scarface (and later, the Grand Theft Auto III radio station "Flashback FM"). Harry's single 'Feel the Spin', produced by John "Jellybean" Benitez, was released in 1985 , and along with the whole soundtrack to the film Krush Groove, peaked at #5 on the U.S. Dance Charts. The song's 'uno dos tres quatro' intro has been sampled on a number of records including S-Express's 'Theme From S-Express'.

While recording her fourth album in 1992 Deborah Harry collaborated with German metallers Die Haut on the track 'Don't Cross My Mind', and released the song 'Prelude to a Kiss' on the soundtrack to the film of the same name. She also released a cover of 'Summertime Blues' from the soundtrack to the film That Night in Australia.

In the mid-nineties, Harry teamed up with NYC avant-garde jazz ensemble The Jazz Passengers. Between 1994 and 1998 she was a permanent member of the troupe, touring North America and Europe. She was a featured vocalist on their 1994 album In Love singing the track 'Dog In Sand'. The follow-up album, 1997's Individually Twisted, is credited as "The Jazz Passengers featuring Deborah Harry" and Harry sings vocals throughout, teaming up with guest Elvis Costello for a cover of 'Doncha Go Way Mad'. The album also features a re-recorded version of the song 'The Tide Is High', which she had previously had a hit with while a part of Blondie. A live album entitled Live In Spain, again featuring Harry on vocals, was released in 1998.

Harry collaborated on a number of other projects with other artists. She featured as vocalist on Talking Heads side project The Heads' 1996 release No Talking Just Head (performing the title track and 'Punk Lolita'). She also sings on a cover of 'Strawberry Fields' by Argentinian band Los Fabulosos Cadillacs. In 1997 she collaborated with Jazz Passenger Bill Ware in his side project Groove Thing, singing lead vocals on the club hit 'Command and Obey'. Another JP collaboration appeared on the Edgar Allan Poe tribute album Closed On Account of Rabies (1997). Harry also reunited with Blondie keyboardist Jimmy Destri for a cover of Otis Blackwell's 'Don't Be Cruel' for the 1995 tribute album Brace Yourself. During this period she also recorded a duet with Robert Jacks entitled Die Enziger Weg (The Only Way) - Theme from Texas Chainsaw Massacre, although this did not surface until 1999. Likewsie, at the end of 1999 Chrysalis Records released a best of her solo recordings entitled 'Most of All' and a remix of 'I Want That Man'.

Aside from writing and recording material for Blondie, Harry pursued a number of solo projects. She appears on the 2001 Bill Ware album Vibes 4 singing the track 'Me and You' as well as on ex-Police guitarist Andy Summers's album, Peggy's Blue Skylight on the track 'Weird Nightmare'. A techno cover of Stan Jones' 'Ghost Riders in the Sky' was featured on the soundtrack to the film Three Business Men and was available on her website to download. Harry sings on two tracks on Andrea Griminelli's Cinema Italiano project; 'Amarcord' and 'You'll Come To Me', as well as on a tribute album reinterpreting the music of Harold Arlen, on which she sings the title track 'Stormy Weather'. A high point in Deborah Harry's career as a solo artist came in May 2002 when accompanied by The Jazz Passengers and the BBC Concert Orchestra she performed a selection of her jazz material at the Barbican Centre in London, UK. In 2003 she was featured vocalist on the song 'Uncontrollable Love' by electro-clash dance producers Blow Up.

Acting roles

She appeared on Broadway with Andy Kaufman in the wrestling play Teaneck Tanzi. A retitled version of the British play Trafford Tanzi, the show failed to transplant itself successfully to Broadway, and opened and closed in one night. Later that year Harry, who had already appeared in a number of independent and underground films, made her major motion picture debut in the David Cronenberg film Videodrome, in which she plays the character Nicki Brand.

Following the release of Rockbird, Debbie took a number of acting roles including the part of Velma Von Tussle in John Waters' 'Hairspray' (1988). She also appeared in the U.S. TV series Wiseguy. A cover of the The Castaways' 'Liar Liar' from the soundtrack to the film Married to the Mob was released as a single in the U.S. Harry's version of Micheal Jay's 'Mind Over Matter' was also recorded in this period, but never released.

She also starred in the film Intimate Stranger in which she played a telephone sex worker pursued by a serial killer. Some of Harry's notable film roles are appearances in Videodrome (1983); Union City (1980); New York Beat (otherwise known as Downtown '81, in which she plays the angel of the East Village alongside Jean-Michel Basquiat); Rock & Rule (1983), an animated movie where she did vocals opposite Robin Zander of Cheap Trick; John Waters' Hairspray (1988), in which she played the big-haired and villainous Velma von Tussle, paired with Sonny Bono as her husband Franklin and Colleen Fitzpatrick as her equally villainous daughter Amber.; and Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990). She also had notable roles in such films as Spun, Cop Land, Heavy and My Life Without Me, and is featured in David Munro's upcoming feature film Full Grown Men.

Her TV guest appearances include The Muppet Show, MADtv, Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, Will & Grace, Absolutely Fabulous, Saturday Night Live (as a musical guest and a host) and Wiseguy.

She had a voice role in the video game, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, as a cab dispatcher.

Sang "Ghost Riders in the Sky" over the closing credits of Alex Cox's film Three Businessmen.

She played the role of "Elizabeth" in the FMV-based game Double Switch, which was released for the Sega CD (1993), the Sega Saturn, Apple Macintosh, and Windows 95.

She played the lead in the 2005 short film I Remember You Now directed by Henry S. Miller, and worked with the same director again in his 2007 psychological thriller Anamorph.

Current projects

  • Harry is one of the faces of MAC Cosmetics' Viva Glam VI campaign. The campaign donates every cent of the selling price of their iconic lipstick shades to the MAC AIDS Fund, which helps people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide.
  • European Tour in July 2007 (with Blondie).

Discography

See also: Blondie discography

Albums

Year Album Chart positions
U.S. UK
1981 Koo Koo 28 6
1986 Rockbird 97 32
1989 Def, Dumb and Blonde 123 12
1993 Debravation1 – –
2007 Necessary Evil TBR TBR
  • 1 indicates all the chart listings for the album have not been located, meaning they charted but the numbers are unavailable.

Compilations/Non-LPs

Singles

Artist Year Song US Hot 100 US Dance US Modern Rock UK singles Album
Debbie Harry 1981 "Backfired" 43 29 - 32 Koo Koo
Debbie Harry 1981 "The Jam Was Moving" 82 - - - Koo Koo
Debbie Harry 1983 "Rush, Rush" 105 28 - 87 Scarface (Soundtrack)
Debbie Harry 1985 "Feel The Spin" - 5 - - Krush Groove (Soundtrack)
Debbie Harry 1986 "French Kissin' in the USA" 57 - - 8 Rockbird
Debbie Harry 1986 "In Love With Love" 70 1 - 45 Rockbird
Debbie Harry 1986 "Free To Fall" - - - 46 Rockbird
Debbie Harry 1988 "Liar, Liar" - - 14 - Married To The Mob (Soundtrack)
Deborah Harry 1989 "I Want That Man" - - 2 13 Def, Dumb and Blonde
Deborah Harry 1989 "Kiss It Better" - - 12 - Def, Dumb and Blonde
Deborah Harry 1989 "Brite Side" - - - 59 Def, Dumb and Blonde
Deborah Harry 1990 "Sweet and Low" - 17 - 57 Def, Dumb and Blonde
Deborah Harry 1990 "Maybe For Sure" - - - 89 Def, Dumb and Blonde
Deborah Harry 1993 "I Can See Clearly" - 2 - 23 Debravation
Deborah Harry 1993 "Strike Me Pink" - - - 46 Debravation
Groove Thing featuring Debbie Harry 1997 "Command and Obey" - 42 - - This Is No Time
Groove Thing featuring Debbie Harry 1999 "Command and Obey" (Remix) - 49 - - -
Moby featuring Debbie Harry 2006 "New York, New York" - - - 43 Go: The Very Best of Moby
Debbie Harry 2007 "Two Times Blue" - - - - Necessary Evil

Filmography

Upcoming:

References

  1. ^ Rohan, Virginia. "North Jersey-bred and talented too", The Record (Bergen County), June 18, 2007. Accessed June 25, 2007. "Debbie Harry: Class of 1963, Hawthorne High School"
  2. ^ Robert Camuto (February 1981). "Does Blondie Really Have More Fun?". Boulevards. Retrieved 2006-07-30.
  3. ^ "More Males Per Oxide". Record Mirror (mirrored at Blondie fansite). April 28 1979. Retrieved 2006-09-26. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ D Harry, No Exit Tour Book, (New York: Blondie Music, Inc., 1999).
  5. ^ 2004 Guinness World Book of Records (paper) (in English), p. 18. ISBN 0-85112-180-2. "Humans" chapter.
  6. ^ "Three questions with Debbie Harry..." Las Vegas Weekly (mirrored at official Deborah Harry web site). June 7 2007. Retrieved 2007-07-04. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ^ http://jackiebeatrules.com/blog/?page_id=13
  8. ^ http://www.rainbownetwork.com/Music/detail.asp?iData=20714&iCat=111&iChannel=17&nChannel=Music

Official sites

Fan sites

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