Remembering When Blondie Battled Their Record Label (And Won) to Release an Album With a Pair of No. 1 Hits in 1980

Record company executives are kind of like football referees. You rarely notice them until they get something wrong. Then there’s an uproar about how they could have possibly done their jobs so poorly.

Well, we’re here to pile on a bit by looking back at the Blondie album Autoamerican. The band noted after the fact how their label gave it the big thumbs-down, only to watch it produce two No. 1 singles.

Blondie’s Rise

When Blondie emerged in the mid-70s, they immediately grabbed the attention of critics. Their bold instrumental blend, which helped birth New Wave in America, broke out of the staid rock scene. And Debbie Harry stood out as one of the most captivating lead singers of her era.

Despite having a sound that was pretty pop-friendly, however, it took the band a while to get noticed by mainstream radio. On their third album, Parallel Lines, new producer Mike Chapman scoured through their catalog of unused songs to find something that was perfect for their pop breakthrough. He found “Heart Of Glass”, which went right to No. 1 as the band’s first Top 40 hit.

Hits “One Way Or Another” and “Dreaming” followed from the Eat To The Beat album. And the band started out in 1980 with a No. 1 with “Call Me” from the American Gigolo soundtrack. Blondie had the music world at their feet. They decided to use their clout to try something different with their next album.

Rap and Reggae

Blondie relocated to California to record Autoamerican, which was released in 1980. The band decided that they wanted to stretch out their musical boundaries in their new environs. They recorded songs that bounced all over the place in terms of the genres they attempted.

That included hip-hop, a style that hadn’t yet been incorporated by any other pop-rock band with any seriousness. Rap enthralled Harry, who decided to tack her own attempt at the genre onto the slinky “Rapture”.

Meanwhile, Chris Stein of Blondie stumbled upon a song first done by a Jamaican group called The Paragons back in 1967. He didn’t hesitate because “The Tide Is High” was more reggae than rock. Instead, he simply realized that the song was a perfect fit for Harry’s sultry vocals. Not only did the band record their cover version for Autoamerican, but they also intended it for their first single. But Chrysalis Records wasn’t so thrilled with that idea, or the rest of the album, for that matter.

We Don’t Hear a Single

In an interview with American Songwriter about Autoamerican, Blondie band members Debbie Harry, Chris Stein, and Clem Burke each recalled the reticence from Chrysalis.

Harry: “When we turned it in, I don’t think it was accepted right away by the label.”

Stein: “Very famously, when we gave the record to Chrysalis, they said they didn’t hear any singles on it.”

Burke: “The classic line from the record company when we delivered the record: ‘We don’t hear a hit.’ And the record resulted in two #1s.”

Luckily, the band had enough clout at that time to get their way despite the objections. Autoamerican came out as intended. “The Tide Is High” and “Rapture” arrived as singles.

And both of those songs went right to No. 1. In other words, a famously bad call by a record label was decisively overturned.

(Photo by Pete Still/Redferns)

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