Face It: A Memoir

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During this time, both Harry and Stein befriended graffiti artist Fab Five Freddy, who introduced them to the emerging hip-hop scene in the Bronx. Freddy is mentioned in "Rapture". [27] Through Fab Five Freddy they were also able to connect with Grandmaster Flash [28] who is played by Jean-Michel Basquiat in the video. [27] "Rapture" became the first rap-oriented song to reach No. 1 in the US Billboard charts. [29] Grandmaster Flash said Harry "opened up so many doors for hip hop" by mentioning him in Rapture. [30] Bronson, Fred (2003). The Billboard Book of Number One Hits. Billboard Books. p.549. ISBN 978-0-823-07677-2. I think it's the same as having a flu shot basically, another way of looking after yourself,” she wrote in her memoir Face It.

Face It by Debbie Harry | Waterstones

Her collaboration and friendship with Warhol continued and she was his first guest on the MTV show Andy Warhol's Fifteen Minutes. The first episode opened with Harry announcing the theme: "Sex, Vegetables, Brothers and Sisters". [31] Simon, Scott (June 5, 2010). "How Times Have Changed, Ex-Playboy Bunnies Say". NPR. Actress Lauren Hutton was a Bunny, as was singer Deborah Harry... I enjoyed this a lot because I can answer yes to all of these questions. I was pretty young in the 1980s so I did not get into that scene during its heyday. But, in the 90s, my friends and I were all about late 70s and 80s alternative music. I listened to a lot of Blondie and many of the other acts she talks about in this book. I regret that I never got to see CBGBs or witness the late 70s music scene in New York – even though it sounds like it was not an “if” but a “when” I would have been mugged or beaten up! It is amazing how harrowing and interesting day to day life was for Harry as she spent her formative years in New Jersey and New York City – and she mentions several times that this was before they cleaned it all up. Early in her new memoir— Face It, written in collaboration with Sylvie Simmons—Debbie Harry recounts an anecdote from her childhood: “One visit, when I was a baby, my doctor gave me a lingering look. And then he turned in his white coat, grinned at my parents, and said, ‘Watch out for that one, she has bedroom eyes’.” I got a job working at a health club and I started dating a guy who was a painting contractor. The normal life.”In the early 80s, Harry and Stein – they were in a relationship for 13 years – lost everything. Their debut album, the eponymous Blondie, came out in 1976, and for years they toured the world; they had six No 1 UK hits, including Heart of Glass and Call Me, and sold 40m records. When the US Internal Revenue Service hit them with a huge bill for unpaid tax, they lost their New York townhouse; the IRS even took some of her clothes, she writes. Worse, Stein was in hospital recovering from an autoimmune disease – Harry would spend the next few years looking after him – and they were not sure how they would pay his medical bills. It also meant the end of the band. In June 1979, Blondie was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone. Harry's persona, combining cool sexuality with streetwise style, became so closely associated with the group's name that many came to believe "Blondie" was the singer's name. The difference between the individual Harry and the band Blondie was emphasized by a "Blondie is a group" button campaign by the band in 1979. [25] The band's success continued with the release of the platinum-selling Eat to the Beat album (UK No. 1, US No. 17) in September. [26]

Face It by Debbie Harry | Waterstones Face It by Debbie Harry | Waterstones

I hated my looks as a kid but I could not stop staring.” So says Debbie Harry in her memoir Face It. Well, yes – who could ever stop staring at this extraordinarily beautiful woman? I certainly couldn’t and it is impossible to talk about Harry without discussing her appearance. Thankfully, Harry doesn’t try. Mostly she stands at some distance from herself chatting about how she put together her look. She is always visually hyper-aware. She learns how to be photographed and wonders whether if it’s true that photos steal a part of your soul – for if so she wouldn’t have a soul left. From early on she is seeking to control her image but perhaps it’s only now that she is doing so. I hate coyness in memoirs so I appreciated Debbie letting loose with names along with her honest feelings and opinions of her talent, looks, friends, and past relationships. Not being familiar with the punk music scene of the 1970s (I couldn’t name a Ramones song to save my life), some of the name dropping went over my head but I was captivated by her stories that were heartbreaking (Chris Stein's illness), infuriating (bankruptcy due to ignorance), and hilarious (Penn Jillette’s hot tub invention due to Debbie's rant). The book has a needless, hippyish introduction from Chris Stein, Blondie’s guitarist and resident photographer and Harry’s former lover. Harry needs no such introduction but it’s a reminder that she and Stein are from the LSD-dabbling generation that the nascent British punk scene so deeply rejected. It is worth remembering just how puritanical parts of punk were. Following her path from glorious commercial success to heroin addiction, the near-death of partner Chris Stein, a heart-wrenching bankruptcy, and Blondie’s breakup as a band to her multifaceted acting career in more than thirty films, a stunning solo career and the triumphant return of her band, and her tireless advocacy for the environment and LGBTQ rights, Face It is a cinematic story of a woman who made her own path, and set the standard for a generation of artists who followed in her footsteps—a memoir as dynamic as its subject.The tone is chatty and personal (it read as if the editor let her have reasonably free rein), and I had to take frequent breaks to locate videos and photos mentioned in the narration. And while Debbie is very candid, there is a feeling some of the really good stuff was omitted which is validated near the conclusion when she admits there are more stories to tell but she is a "private person" and unsure if she'll divulge them at some future date. This reader hopes she does.

Face It: A Memoir by Debbie Harry | Goodreads

Still she remains aloof, made of steel but strangely maternal to all around her. She likes a cigarette these days and appears to be having more fun than at the height of her career. Fame, she says, was about wanting to make things happen – Harry did that all right, with her off-kilter dancing, her ability to radiate cool, her sheer presence. In 1997, Blondie began working together again for the first time in 15years. The four original members (Harry, Stein, Clem Burke and Jimmy Destri) began sessions for what would become Blondie's seventh studio album, No Exit (1999). The lead single from the album, " Maria", debuted at No. 1 in the UK, giving Blondie their sixth UK No. 1 hit. "Maria" also reached No. 1 in 14 countries, the top 10 on the US Dance Charts, and Top 20 on the US Adult Top 40 Charts. No Exit debuted at No. 3 in the UK and No. 17 in the US. Few women have been objectified as much as Harry. Her face – those killer cheekbones and heart-shaped mouth – is immortalised on Blondie album covers and in Warhol’s famous portrait. Was she always aware of men’s reaction to her? “I think we all have issues of self-esteem and I’m not clear of that,” she says, by way of an answer. “I also think that because it’s my occupation – to be a performer and to attract attention and to appeal to sexuality – it’s sort of a given in showbiz.”

Watch Arcade Fire Duet With Debbie Harry". Rolling Stone. April 14, 2014 . Retrieved August 15, 2017. So, fans of Debbie Harry, those who will brook no criticism of her, maybe you’ll want to skip this review. I can seem judgmental, more so with a memoir than with a biography written by a third party or a ghost writer. If she was ever truly afraid, Harry hides it well. I read her memoir looking for traces of the poisoned apple and serpents in the garden but, for the most part, Harry seems to have been inoculated against the former and able to charm the latter. Readers hoping for dirt dished and axes honed or buried won’t find much here. Despite her insistence that “it’s hard for me to find the fun” in Blondie’s success, Debbie Harry comes across as one of those rare people who has found not just a happy ending but a happy beginning and middle, too. Or, as she admits, “Maybe it’s like the King of Comedy said, ‘you just take all the terribly serious and dreadful stories and make them funny’.”

Face It – HarperCollins Face It – HarperCollins

Your enjoyment of this book will increase with each one of the following criteria you can answer “Yes”: She is still working, writing and touring. She would quite like to do “a real serious role in film or in TV, but that’s sort of wishful thinking”. There may be another solo album at some point, and another book. She jumps around and and talks about everything under the sun, but without really making much sense at all. In one scene she talks about how Miles Davis was a patron in a bar she worked out and all she says is that his date spoke for him and she (Harry) didn't understand why they sat him in a table upstairs. Um...okay. Hip-Hop Week: DJ Kool Herc / Grandmaster Flash". Fresh Air (Podcast). NPR. August 28, 2023. Event occurs at 33:00.

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. [33] People, me included, have found it hard to fathom her reaction. For this reason, she says: “I’m sort of wondering if I should have left it out [of the book], but it’s part of the story.” It feels wrong to push her on it too much. “I can’t explain it,” she says, as she talks about whether it had any lasting impact. “I didn’t want it to. I just said: ‘I’m not hurt, I’m alive, I’m doing what I want to do, I have a wonderful boyfriend’ – and that was it. I had to consider what was important to me, and being a victim was really not who I wanted to be.” Perhaps, I suggest, minimising it has helped protect her from it? She smiles. “Yeah. Absolutely.” As an adopted person, I have always had a heightened sense of curiosity and feeling different. Can you relate to that? DavidMcr Debbie Harry shared her secrets to looking young as she admitted having a facelift for “business reasons". a b Harrington, Richard (November 30, 1986). "Debbie Harry, On Beyond Blondie". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on October 9, 2019.