‘Call Me’: the Blondie song about prostitution
At the peak of their popularity, Blondie were an unstoppable hit machine. However, unlike much of the music filling the pop charts at the time, the group were unafraid to add meaning to every one of their releases, tackling taboo subjects with an effortless swagger. While their peers may have run scared, Blondie refused to stay quiet.
Singer Debbie Harry wrote ‘One Way Or Another’ after she was stalked and decided to put a comical spin on a frightening incident. At face value, the track sounds like a fun-filled pop song. However, the true meaning behind the song is horrifyingly sinister and not a topic appropriate for daytime radio, yet, Blondie ignored convention. Similarly, on ‘Call Me’, the New Yorkers looked to the dark side once again and explored prostitution.
Harry penned ‘Call Me’ after the band were tasked with writing a song for the film American Gigolo. The opportunity also allowed Blondie to work with the legendary composer Giorgio Moroder, who was making the soundtrack, and the collaboration marked a bucket list moment for the band.
In the film, Richard Gere portrays a male escort called Julian, who is afforded a high-class lifestyle through his line of work and mixes within the upper echelons of society. In a pivotal scene in the film, when Julian is paying the bills by fulfilling his obligations with clients, ‘Call Me’ plays and elevates the storytelling.
For the song, Harry transported himself into the mind of Gere’s character, and the lyrics to ‘Call Me’ flowed out of her. Speaking to Spin in 1986 about her songwriting process, the vocalist said: “It varied. I’ve done every single possibility. We’ve worked out songs live. I wrote ‘X Offender’ live. I wrote ‘One Way or Another’ that way with Nigel Harrison. I wrote ‘Call Me’ instantly after seeing a rough edit of American Gigolo.”
In 2021, Harry looked back upon the collaboration with The Talks and said, “I think some of the best songs I’ve written or made lyrics for are on some of those solo albums. And I was always hopeful that my work, my lyrics, would be used in a film.”
She continued: “It’s odd how those things work out, isn’t it? When Chris Stein and I first started working together, we talked about all these composers, Nino Rota, Henry Mancini, and soundtracks and things that we liked. So for somebody to put a Blondie song into a movie, it was a big highlight for us. It was a big moment. And working with Giorgio Moroder on ‘Call Me’ was sort of like a dream come true.”
Unfortunately, Moroder didn’t enjoy the experience of working with Blondie as much as they revelled in being under his guidance. The Italian composer later confessed to Billboard that the New Yorkers put him off ever working with a band again. “There were always fights,” he told the publication. “I was supposed to do an album with them after that. We went to the studio, and the guitarist was fighting with the keyboard player. I called their manager and quit.”
An album from Moroder and Blondie is a dreamy combination, but due to their behaviour, it’ll have to be left to our imaginations. Thankfully, ‘Call Me’ stands as a delicious taster of what the potential record would have sounded like between the two acts.
