Why Debbie Harry always felt like “the bottom rung” of CBGBs scene
Although it may not seem like it now, there was once a time when Debbie Harry felt like Blondie sat at the very bottom of the CBGB food chain, but not for the reasons you might think.
Before the new wave explosion in New York, Harry and Chris Stein were already geared up for success in the scene. Performing at clubs like CBGBs and Club 82, the pair rode a wave of pure musical energy, letting raw intuition lead the way, despite not necessarily “looking” like the quintessential punk-rock group at the time.
After all, with Harry fronting the band, they already stuck out like a sore thumb, but Harry’s confidence and forthcoming nature were what made it work well, even when sections of their audience were drawn to them for shallow or trivial reasons. Harry didn’t care all that much about that, though, not when she was doing what she loved, and everything else was merely background noise in a scene that was already erratic and loud.
It’s no surprise, then, that people often credit Blondie with sparking the entire new wave scene, even Harry herself, who once said it was their fluidity that “paved the way” for the beginnings of the movement. “We really got the New York scene going,” Harry told Interview in 1979, saying that their rotation of musicians was one of the things that set them apart from the rest at first.
In fact, the only other group she saw in a similar vein was Television, with the two shaping one of the most significant turning points in music history, all centred around the simple art of greater artistic freedom during a time when such spaces were scarce. That space eventually paved the way for other revolutionary bands like Talking Heads, blowing the door open for others to venture forth and shatter convention.
However, along with being an outlier at the CBGBs for obvious reasons, Harry also believes that they were somewhat looked down upon, especially when compared to other quintessential punk icons, like Patti Smith. In fact, when pitted against legendary generational mouthpieces like Smith, Harry sees Blondie as a far less authentic force, and that their artistic identities were completely different.
As she explained to Uncut, when responding to claims that the pair hated each other, she argued that she didn’t believe Smith would “waste her time” hating her, and that Blondie were “at the bottom rung of the whole CBGBs ladder”.
She added, “She came at her craft from a literary, intellectual point of view, whereas I, although I have read some books, you know! – but I think I came strictly from a more underground pop-culture thing.”
Despite rumours of a previous feud between the pair – that seemingly involved Smith recruiting some of Blondie’s members for her tour – Harry clearly holds no grudges, instead viewing Smith’s legacy through a more objective lens. That said, this isn’t exactly uncommon when it comes to Harry’s views on the scene she helped to revolutionise, especially regarding her so-called legendary status and the reasons she takes a more humble position whenever she discusses it.
In her memoir Face It, for instance, she made it clear why she can’t and won’t view herself as an icon, saying that the first time she heard the term attached to her name, she thought it was “preposterous” because she was “having every type of problem that everybody else has”. Thus, she might appreciate all her achievements separately, but when it comes to others’ impact, she typically resists those kinds of unnecessary grandiose labels.
