R.I.P. Fred "Tonic" Smith of Television, Blondie, Fleshtones

Sadly, bassist Fred Smith – who played with Television, Blondie & The Fleshtones – has passed away at 77. He'll be greatly missed.

LINKS

Stereogum Television bassist Fred Smith dead at 77

R.I.P. Blondie drummer Clem Burke, 1954-2025

Sadly, Clem Burke – longtime Blondie drummer who played with Pete Townshend, Iggy Pop, Empty Hearts and others has passed away after a battle with cancer. 

LINKS
Rolling Stone Clem Burke, Blondie drummer dead at 70

Watch Blondie live in Tokyo, 1978 and other classic early performances

Celebrating Debbie Harry's birthday with a few fab early Blondie performances including a Tokyo appearance in January 1978. 

Blondie's Chris Stein releases new memoir Under A Rock

Chris Stein used the pandemic lockdown to write an intriguing memoir Under A Rock available now. Get it here.   

LINKS

Forbes Blondie's Chris Stein on his influential band's career via his new memoir

The Vinyl District The Chris Stein interview

Happy Birthday Chris Stein!

Here's Blondie's Chris Stein & Debbie Harry chatting with Merv Griffin in 1981 and the BBC doc, When Blondie Came To Britain. 

Watch out – Blondie's Chris Stein just penned a memoir!

Chris Stein had a ringside seat in NYC for all the shenanigans surrounding the advent of punk rock, disco, new wave and hip hop. This should be good.   

Here's the scoop...

Debbie Harry defined iconic band Blondie’s look. Chris Stein—her performing partner, lover, and lifelong friend—was its architect and defined its sound. “Parallel Lines”, their third album, catapulted to #1, sold 20 million copies, and launched singles like “Heart of Glass”, “Rapture,” and “One Way or Another”, providing the beat when Bianca Jagger and Halston danced at Studio 54 and the soundtrack to every 1970’s punk-soundtracked romance.

Chris Stein knows how to tell a story. Under A Rock is his nothing-spared autobiography. It's about the founding of the band, ascending to the heights of pop success, and the hazards of fortune.

Famous names march through these pages—Warhol, Bowie, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and more–but you can get famous names anywhere. What you can’t get anywhere else is a plunge into the moments that made a giant 1980's artistic sensation. Stein takes us there in this revelatory, propulsive, distinctive memoir. 

Adds Chris Stein: "I'm quite looking forward to people interacting with this. Be prepared to look stuff up. Also there's a lot of weird ass stuff that might seem made up but really actually happened. Out next year."

Pre-order a copy of Chris Stein's memoir Under A Rock (St. Martin's Press, ISBN: 9781250286727) in hardcover or digital audio right here. 

Watch Rob Roth's recent hour-long chat with Chris Stein and Debbie Harry in Los Angeles and a 2002 chat with Rolling Stone music writer David Wild below.  

R.I.P. singer/songwriter Jack Lee of The Nerves, 1952-2023

Sadly, Jack Lee – who penned "Hangin' On The Telephone" – has passed away at 71. We're remembering Jack with a few stellar early recordings. 

Before They Were Famous: Robert Vickers

Prior to joining the Go-Betweens, bassist Robert Vickers cut an album with The Colors produced by Clem Burke!   Photo: Vinny Zuflante 

Robert Vickers recalls his time with The Colors...

"In early 1979 I arrived in New York City on my way to Europe from my home in Brisbane, Australia and accidently got myself into a band with a couple of guys I met the first time I went to CBGBs. I decided to stay. Rent was cheap; CBs and Max’s Kansas City were within walking distance and they had the best new bands playing every night. We played a kind of punk pop heavily influenced by ‘60s and ‘70s pop bands. In about a year we were being managed by the owner of CBGBs, Hilly Kristal and the drummer from Blondie, Clem Burke offered to produce us. A local indie label which was a rare thing in those times put up the money and we went into Electric Lady Studios and recorded an EP with Clem also playing drums. It came out on colored vinyl in a faux Japanese import cover. We were happening.

"Even though we weren’t on a major label or touring the world it still seemed like with were going somewhere fast. The New York music scene then was a world unto itself. Headlining a weekend at CBGBs, the coolest club in the coolest city in this, or any world felt like a pinnacle. Especially for someone like me who had been watching this historic explosion of creativity from afar in the pages of magazines and on the backs of record sleeves. The first wave of CBs bands had now moved on to bigger things and it seemed likely we would too. 

"The major labels passed on us but undeterred we recorded an album with Clem again producing and this track, “Popstar” is one of my songs from it. We kept playing till the end of 1982 but the fire had gone out and by the time the album was released the band was over. I went to London to join some friends from Australia, The Go-Betweens and took some invaluable lessons on life and music with me." – Robert Vickers

Listen to "Popstar" by The Colors along with the rippin' "Rave It Up" below. 

 

That time Blondie flirted with country music back in 1980

Here's an early version of Blondie's "Go Through It' called "I Love You Honey, Give Me A Beer" from their forthcoming box set. 

That time Van Duren went to New York City cut an album in 1977

Here's Memphis singer/songwriter Van Duren standing against the mirrored wall of NYC's Hurrah in the summer of 1977.

Recalls Van Duren...

When the first few days of July come around each year I think about where I was in 1977. Healing from a broken relationship in Memphis, I had bought a one-way ticket to NYC to make my first album, what became "Are You Serious?" Arriving in the East Village with my guitars and suitcases, a few bags of weed and $130 in mid-June, I stayed in a tiny efficiency apartment at 175 Thompson St. with the album's producers, Jon Tiven and Doug Snyder, and within 2 weeks we had made a couple of train trips up to the Connecticut studio to begin recording. The following is an excerpt from my unpublished memoir:

"In late June Big Sound Records threw a press party/showcase in the City at a “New Wave” dance club called Hurrah, which was at 36 West 62nd St on the second floor. The party drew an interesting mix of music biz types, punk rockers, and a few longhairs like me. Two of the label's great bands performed, beginning with Roger C. Reale & Rue Morgue who opened the showcase. Chuck Reale was a schoolteacher by day and an amazing vocalist, bass player, and songwriter by night. His band featured my new friends Jimmy McAllister on guitar and Hilly Michaels on drums, and that trio was just a monster! The quick succession of short, very smart songs just electrified the room, and opened my eyes in a big way.

Big Sound’s most important and popular act, the Scratch Band, took the stage as the headliner, and proceeded to play a dazzling, tight set of R & B-infused rock and soul. Lead singers Christine Ohlman and Robert Orsi were riveting with Orsi also blowing an intense blues harmonica, and bassist Paul Ossola covered so much ground with his Fender Jazz bass that it was nothing short of an education for me. The guitarist was George “G.E.” Smith. This guy was truly a revelation on electric guitar, all the while with a huge grin on his face. Behind the drum kit was a young kid who held the whole thing together, playing with an amazing style that was far beyond his years. I instantly wanted to play music with him. Little did I know that this dream would find a reality in the near (and distant) future. His name was Mickey Curry.

One person who caught my eye was a striking young blonde woman, high cheekbones, mysterious smile. She was with a group of guys, in conversation, so I stayed where I was, leaning up against a mirrored wall, nursing a drink and a smoke. The event was only about two hours long, so when the club began to open to the public we spilled out into the street. 

I had brought 8 bags (ounces) of weed with me, as I mentioned, to sell and raise a little food money. One night Jon said he knew someone who wanted a bag. Great! “My friend, Richard, is dropping by.” The doorbell rang, and I opened the door: it was Richard Hell in a great trench coat, boots, and spiked hair. He was a very cool guy—a talented bassist and writer, and his band was one of the better New York bands I’d heard. Richard, Jon, and I talked a few minutes, but he was in a rush, so we made the deal and he went on his way. “That’s one for the autobiography,” I never even thought.

After we completed the initial guide tracks for the album in the studio on 7/1, the July 4th weekend was almost upon us. Doug and Jon were staying in Connecticut, but I decided to go back to the East Village on my own. The 4th was on a Monday, and we had scheduled Hilly's drum sessions to begin on Wednesday July 6th. The guys dropped me at the Conrail station in Milford, CT, on Friday the 2nd, and I caught the train to Grand Central in Manhattan. From there I took the subway downtown and walked to Thompson Street, stopping on Bleecker to pick up a hippie roll and a beer. I slept on one of the apartment’s beds that night. The cockroaches in that place were so big, you could hear them in the paper grocery bags of trash in the kitchenette. Truth! But I was in New York City...

When I walked past the Village Gate on my way to Thompson Street, I saw a poster out front promoting a band called Blondie starting a three-night run that very night. But what really caught my attention was the opening act on the third night: Alex Chilton. So on Sunday night July 3rd, I went to the Village Gate and saw Alex open the show with his trio, which included a guy named Chris Stamey on bass. They were beyond loose, and Alex was more disjointed than I’d seen him—which fit in perfectly in 1977 New York. After their set, I walked over and said hello to Alex, briefly, and introduced myself to Mr. Stamey, who was far more friendly. Eventually, Blondie took the stage, and I was pleasantly surprised at how good they were. But, wait a minute. The blonde girl singing was the blonde from the Hurrah party! Only then did I realize that she was Deborah Harry. Holy crap! I was really glad I had gone to that show. That's when I became a Blondie fan.

The next day, the Fourth of July, started out eerily quiet. Only then did I find out that many New Yorkers left the city for the holiday weekend, so the sounds of the neighborhood were somewhat subdued. In the late afternoon I decided to take a walk down into Soho, which was just a few blocks south of where I was. It was an Italian neighborhood in those days, closer to working class, and the people there had strung banners and lights and ribbons across the streets from building to building to celebrate Independence Day. Children were playing here and there as their parents talked and sang and laughed and drank. Older folks in folding chairs spoke in what I imagined were Italian dialects, and the whole scene was like something out of a 1930's film. It was beautiful. 

After a couple of hours I wandered back toward the Village as the sun began to set behind the World Trade Center and fireworks popped everywhere. I went in the apartment building’s front door, past our place on the first floor and took the stairs up 4 floors to the tar paper-floored rooftop. I sat there alone on the ledge, smoking a cigarette, drinking a beer, watching the fireworks all around the skyline. It suddenly struck me how romantic the moment was. And yet, those feelings were hopeless. In those moments, I felt like they would always be. While I was still trying to believe where I actually was, it didn’t really matter. Wherever I would ever be, I would be a romantic in exile." 

From "Cartwheeling: A Musician's Life" (copyright 2022 Van Duren) (And no, I don't know if it will ever be published). Get a copy of Van Duren's debut album "Are You Serious?" – reissued without much fanfare by Omnivore – right here. Check out "Yellow Light" below. Be sure to check out Wade Jackson and Greg Carey's fab 2018 documentary Waiting: The Van Duren Story (here's the link) and the excellent accompanying soundtrack. 

Happy Birthday Debbie Harry!

Cheers to Debbie Harry! Here's a chat about her "Face It" memoir and an unboxing of Blondie's new Against The Odds anthology. 

The Split Squad – America's least famous supergroup – issue 2nd album!

The Fleshtones Keith Streng & Blondie's Clem Burke have issued a second Split Squad album, Another Cinderella. Hear "Hey DJ"

Happy Birthday Chris Stein!

Celebrating the birthday of musician and photographer Chris Stein with a Blondie performance from '78 and a couple of interviews. 

Happy Birthday Clem Burke!

Celebrating the birthday of drummer extraordinaire Clem Burke with a tour of his LPs and a short interview with Tom Green. 

Happy Birthday Chris Stein!

Cheers to Blondie mainman and photographer deluxe Chris Stein on his 70th birthday! 

LINKS
Morrison Hotel Gallery – Chris Stein's photographs

Happy Birthday Clem Burke!

Celebrating the birthday of drummer deluxe Clem Burke with a few vintage Blondie performance clips from 1977 and 1979.  

The Exploders @ Duggan's Brewery, Saturday

Check The Exploders' cover of Blondie's 1977 gem Kung Fu Girls recorded by Jim Diamond in Detroit, 1999.

The Split Squad @ The Horseshoe, Thursday

Watch The Fleshtones' Keith Streng get down with Blondie's Clem Burke and Eddie Muñoz of the Plimsouls.