Written by Emma Batrick
Please donât sing Iâll Stand by You.
Thatâs all I keep thinking. Pretty insulting to a woman whose career is older than I am and has a voice that sounds as fresh as when she started out.
Spotlights dot the stage and an acoustic guitar is plucked, an eerie whistle carries the tune along with Chrissie Hyndeâs voice, âSpin me a yarn and draw me inside. Tourniquet to stop the bleeding, the arms that held her are gone.â It sounds a bit Anna Calvi/Nick Cave, a lament about Stockholm syndrome, and track nine from Chrissie Hyndeâs new album, Stockholm, which has been branded to be her first as a solo artist and features appearances from Neil Young and Jon McEnroe on guitar. Yes, him.
Pace quickly changes as we dart off to Sweet Nuthinâ, the following track from the same album. âDonât you be such a baby, man up to me, I donât mean maybe.â A line which could sum up both the women taking the stage tonight, as, for want of a better phrase, theyâve both got balls, both fronting bands that have spearheaded and changed the direction of eras of music, and become iconic in its history. Staying upbeat we go back to the Pretendersâ first album with Kid, then onto the next with Message of Love.
She gives off this air that despite the fact that sheâs performed on some of the biggest stages â but never the Roundhouse, which I find ridiculous, as she describes seeing the Ramones, Cat Power and the Brian Jonestown Massacre here â and collaborated with some of the biggest artists, deep down part of her is still the woman with the guitar slung around her neck in music bars asking people if they want to start a band. Her drummer is one of the most athletic Iâve seen, in that he just canât seem to stop dancing and rolling his body along with the music. The keyboard player, from Norwich (she tells you where each of them are from) also plays the French horn and the lead guitarist and bassist are quite excellent. Thereâs a real ease with the way she is with the band, who she introduces many times â she seems eager to give them credit for their work. And when she talks to the audience you donât feel that sheâs putting anything on, filling time while things move around her, or being anything other than her natural self, even singing happy birthday to one fan after saying âItâs your birthday and youâve just turned 30. Fuck off. You look good on it. Donât worry about the drinking and the smoking. Give it another 20 years.â She could be in a tiny pub somewhere. Thatâs how intimate sheâs making this space feel, and personal, as she turns to the balcony and waves âOne of my exes. Fucking hate that guy.â I crane my neck…which one?
âI found a picture of youâ leads to every voice in the room singing oh ohhhh ohhh ohhh. Itâs that song from the radio and everyoneâs childhood. Itâs followed by Wasted Behind Your Dark Sunglasses, upbeat and gloriously pop from her new album, followed by whatâs introduced to be a very sad song (please donât be Iâll Stand by You) also from her new album, Adding the Blue. No one seems to be taking this new slow song as the opportunity to run to the bar, pee, or even look at their phone. Sheâs got the audience rapt, and after shouts âAny requests? Weâll do it!â I have to stop myself shouting Tattoed Love Boys as a cheer goes up for the start of Back on the Chain Gang. This is the only time that I could say that I heard anything out of whack, and itâs a shame that itâs on such a recognisable intro, but no oneâs perfect, and itâs not even her thatâs going wrong. The guitar comes off and weâre all dancing away with Chrissie to Donât Get Me Wrong. Yet another guitar gets slung around her shoulders and weâre into the dark yet twinkly-aggressive riff-tastic Precious, which is delightful. As she spits the words Fuck off my ego would have me believe that thatâs aimed at me and my ignorant Please Donât Sing Iâll Stand by Youmantra at the beginning. This goes into Middle of the Road without any preamble, everyone on that stage is having it, and these seem like the songs that they enjoy the most, and you can see where the likes of Karen O should give a nod. She throws her plectrum into the audience, takes out a mouth organ and gets playing.
As she says, âDid you get your U2 record? Yeah? Well go and fucking buy mine.â I will. Iâm just not sure which one. Chrissie Hynde! Fuck yeah. I love Blondie and Iâm worried about going total fan girl about being in the same room as them. I didnât know what to expect with Chrissie Hynde and now Iâm wondering how anyone could follow her.
Wearing monochrome. Thatâs how. I know Debbie Harry has been labelled as a fashion icon and her individuality in dress sense was important to that era, so Iâll just get what she was wearing (I wouldnât tell you what a man was wearing) out the way now.
The band â Debbie Harry, Chris Stein, Clem Burke, Tommy Kessler, Leigh Foxx and Matt Katz-Bohen, come out to this military sounding song and crackly screens behind them. The stage lights up â also monochrome thin parallel lines â and One way or another is growled out to an audience ready to join in, then itâs onto the electro-disco-tastic Rave, from their new album Ghosts of Download/Blondie 4(0)-Ever Greatest Hits, with old footage of the band in the background.
A phone rings. Debbie walks up to the mike and says âUm, helloâ and then belts out Iâm in the phonebooth itâs the one across the hall… Itâs not word perfect, but itâs brilliant, and thereâs no need for the band to be singing the woahs, the audience has that sorted.
Mile High, another new song, is in the same sort of vein as Rave, and I canât help but wonder if Blondie want to take us to a gay bar. Whether the audience have heard the song before or not, I donât know, but all the ohs and yeah yeah yeahs are joined in with, such are the hooks and the stage presence that carries it.
Clem Burkeâs been compared to Keith Moon many a time, but I donât think thatâs fair. Heâs so good, heâs an entity in his own right, behind his Perspex screen, wearing his Ramoneâs T-shirt, busting out an immense solo, throwing his sticks in the air and bashing on into Call Me. Matt Katz-Bohen comes to the front of the stage with a keyboard slung around his neck for the solo, and as more people take the spotlight youâre reminded that this is a band that has never been just about the woman with the now blond wig.
All the new songs seem to be in a much higher vocal key, where Harry seems a bit more comfortable now, actually, and Take Me in Your Arms is no different. This goes into the song that hailed their big comeback in 1999, Maria, which has never been my favourite because in much the same way that the punk purists of the 70s hated their fucking disco record Parallel Lines, I didnât want Blondie to bring out such a noddy pop song. And thatâs exactly what makes it brilliant. Iâd be surprised if there were more than ten people not singing along.
Debbie introduces each member of the band individually, each to great applause. We are in the presence of greatness after all. Legends of the music industry, whether theyâve been in the band from the very start or not. This is the 40th year since Blondie was formed. The woman on stage is 70 next year. As she takes her waistcoat off and adjusts her skirt sheâs still receiving cat calls and cheers. Pervs.
Another new song is introduced, âEuphoria, euphoriaâ Harry drawls, and the reggae beat kicks in. Theyâre still an eclectic group and itâs greatly received and it takes us to the unmistakable intro of Rapture. Iâm pleased to report, the rap is spot on, and I should know, Iâm rapping along with her word for word, until Burke whips up another drum solo and takes us into the Beastie Boys Fight for Your Right to Party.
Harry apologises for the little slip, and says that the band are great so hopefully they make up for her. âYou have to realise that this is the last show of almost three months of touring, Iâm losing my mind and these guys are great.â Sheâs brilliant though. Sheâs not always spot on, her voice hasnât kept as well as Hyndeâs and sometimes her dancing seems so fragmented because she is looking to the rest of the band to work out when she needs to come in. The only thing that really irritates me is that sometimes she runs around the stage just to play up to the camera, but bloody hell, sheâs running around the stage, for an hour and a half, and dancing her socks off. Like I said, Iâm a total fan-girl, itâs killing me not to give a 100% positive review, but as Mike Chapman, producer of their album that made them Parallel Lines once said âItâs all a bit out of sync. Itâs not perfect. And that was the secret I think to keeping the element of Blondie.â This is Blondie.
She talks about the weather for a bit, mudlarks, and then once the time is filled (which, unlike Hynde, it does feel like) we go into the massive singalong of The Tide is High which breaks down into a massive jam session with a jazz feel. Groove is in the heart. Her calls of Baby baby baby build the music up again and weâre off.
Burke spills into another drum solo with videos of him in his younger days rolling behind and da-na-na-nill…Atomic. Fucking hell (thatâs a direct quote from my notes). I donât want to be a massive clichĂ©, but the song is so euphoric, the band so spot on, every single part of the way that it builds and progresses takes you with it and by the end of it you actually feel like youâve witnessed and been through something quite amazing. Forget everything else, how do you follow that?!
Itâs off into the first song from the new album Sugar on the Side, which has a bit of a polka feel, accordion sound and rap ânâ all. The beat lends itself to the next song, immediately recognisable from the cowbell kicking in. Once I had love, and it was a gas…a skull mirrorball floats on the screens behind. I have honestly never seen so many people waving as all the oooh-oooh-ooh-ohs come out, and as it ends it sounds like itâs going into God Save The Queen. It doesnât, but there are still surprises, for me, at least, who has never seen Blondie, to come, despite the fact that theyâve left the stage.
They return to the beat of foot stamping and wild applause and launch into Union City Blues, Harry saying that they still have a couple of songs left. Iâm aching to hear Dreaming and getting ready to be disappointed as she says âWeâve only done this once before and itâs kind of serious but I think weâre all kind of sick of whatâs going on in the worldâ and the sirens sound. No way. I laugh as I realise that itâs Black Sabbathâs War Pigs, which they take into the aggressive disco of War Child, which I love, but looking at the crowd I think I might be the only person thatâs heard it before.
As she says, they end on a lighter note, and they sing me my favourite Blondie song. Itâs always been a close call between this and Atomic, for me, but lyrically â and Harry, as much as she might have been a fashion icon, a sex symbol, scandalous for her risquĂ© behaviour and lyrics about watching people shower, which are tame by todayâs standards is a great lyricist â Dreaming is the one for me.
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