Behind the Classics

ISSUE #29 MMUSICMAG.COM BEHIND THE CLASSICS WRITTEN BY: DEBBIE HARRY, CHRIS STEIN RECORDED: RECORD PLANT, NEW YORK PRODUCED BY: MIKE CHAPMAN DEBBIE HARRY: VOCALS NIGEL HARRISON: BASS CLEM BURKE: DRUMS, DRUM MACHINE CHRIS STEIN: ELECTRIC GUITAR JIMMY DESTRI: KEYBOARDS FRANK INFANTE: GUITAR FROM THE ALBUM: PARALLEL LINES (1978) Gary Valentine, Clem Burke, Debbie Harry, Chris Stein, Jimmy Destri “Heart of Glass” BLONDIE “Everyone was like, ‘Blondie’s gone disco!’” hang out at Club 82 in New York, which was Though the band thought “Heart of Glass” was drummer Clem Burke recalled of the group’s essentially a gay disco. And in the early days, catchy, Chapman convinced them to place it first No. 1 hit. we used to cover songs like ‘Lady Marmalade’ deep in the running order of the album, Parallel It was spring 1979, when the rallying and ‘I Feel Love.’” Lines. Said Chapman, “I didn’t want their fans cry among rockers everywhere was “Disco Bent on establishing a rougher-edged to hear it too early on the record and think, ‘Oh, sucks!” Even new wave and punk bands identity on their first two albums, Blondie Jesus, they’ve become a disco band.’” joined the growing united front against what kept “The Disco Song” in reserve for a future Chrysalis Records hated “Heart of Glass,” they heard as mechanized, soulless music. session. In early 1978, as they entered the along with all of Parallel Lines, delivering the In one infamous incident, thousands of hard- Record Plant for album number three, the old deathblow line: “We don’t hear a single.” line rock fans burned piles of dance records time was right. “Everyone has a different There turned out to be four global hits, at Chicago’s Comiskey Park in a “Disco theory about ‘Heart of Glass,’” Burke said. including the smash “One Way or Another.” Demolition Night.” “If you talk to our producer Mike Chapman, Though MTV was still two years away, So for Blondie, whose previous hits had he’ll say he revamped the song. I know two the video for “Heart of Glass,” with its jump- been mod-flavored rockers like “Hanging on of the big influences behind revamping the cut editing and enraptured close-ups of the Telephone,” to suddenly be in league with song were Kraftwerk, and for me, ‘Stayin’ Harry’s kewpie-doll face, helped propel the the Brothers Gibb was seen as high treason. Alive.’ I was trying to get that groove that song up the charts. When it went No. 1 in But then the quintet was never fully embraced J.R. Robinson did for the Bee Gees.” Burke March 1979, Andy Warhol threw a party for the by the doctrinaire crowd at CBGB—ground shared the drumming duties with the Roland band at famed Studio 54. There was a Blondie zero for America’s punk movement. Too CompuRhythm CR-78. “It was one of the early backlash in the music press, and among some poppy and too pretty, they carved out their drum machines, and it took forever to program former CBGB compadres. Even Blondie own niche, mashing Carnaby Street, Phil it,” Debbie Harry said. “We had to practically bassist Nigel Harrison sheepishly called the Spector, burlesque and art-school cool into record each beat by hand.” song “a compromise with commerciality.” a sexy package. Still, a little punk attitude seeped through But Harry saw it differently. “‘Heart of “Heart of Glass”—originally entitled to subvert the dance rhythm. “The instrumental Glass’ wasn’t really a disco song anyway. It had “Once I Had a Love (The Disco Song)”—had bridge skips a beat,” said Burke. “That’s the disco elements, and I think that was repulsive been lurking in their set for five years. And anti-disco part—to screw people up when to some. But we always wanted to experiment the band’s affection for disco music was no they’re on the dance floor. Burke also added and try different things.” big secret. Burke recalled, “We all used to some decidedly un-disco fills in the fadeout.” –Bill DeMain 78 No29-Mag-Test13.indd 78 8/27/13 12:28 AM.

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