"Heart of Glass" edit
[1] check this again for the discog article maybe explanation of PL title
Background edit
- Blondie--prev two albums/singles--moderately successful--in europe not america
- Ny punk scene that hated disco
- however blondie played disco covers
- Chris always wanted to do disco songs. He's a dadaist. We're running through this new wave/I hate disco/punk rock scene, and Chris wants to do "Disco Inferno" and "Love to Love You Baby." We used to do "Heart of Glass" to upset people. It was his idea to bring it back, but as a funky song...The Disco Song?here
- "disco wasnt cool, we did it to be uncool[2]
- origin in "the disco song" (+ sample)
- pre-1975--possibly before first album--from a former band?...dingy apartment...been around for five years...fed up with it[3]. 1974...we didn't play it that often. We didn't really think much of it.[4]
- reggae influence + unpolished sound
- We changed the feeling of it when we recorded it because it wasn't fitting in with the rest of the record. We always called that our disco song, even when we were doing it as a funk song, around 1975.here
- The original arrangement of "Heart of Glass" - as on the Betrock demos - had doubles on the high-hat cymbals, a more straight-ahead disco beat.here
- chrysalis wanted champan because of his reputation to produce pop smashes[5]
[6] Break America.[7] Mention chapmans pop smash credential s with other bands/records
- june 5-26 1978 Power Station studio [8]
- Chapman was quite diff from prev producer...no chemistry initially.[9]
- exacting standards...quote from liner notes
- plenty about the overall PL recording experience here
Recording edit
http://www.rip-her-to-shreds.com/archive_press_magazines_rhythmxmas03.php
- location of recording, time... details
- HoG was the first song to be recorded on the PL album
- actual recording process... destri's synthesizer hook <multi-layered>
- rowland rhythm machine--chapman spent one and half days to get it right [10]
- "Then Jimmy [Destri] brought in the Farfisa and a little synthesizer; the whole thing had changed."[11]
- "Clem [Burke] had this attitude that he was Keith Moon and just wanted to play every drum all of the time. It was a real challenge to convince them that the early demo of Heart Of Glass was out of tune and out of time."[12]
- made people repeat same thing for hours. "He was a perfectionist. Today, "Heart of Glass" could be done digitally in five to 10 hours. Then, it took us about a week to do it manually. It's crazy how we did it. It was endless repetition until Mike was satisfied. This drove me crazy initially, but then I realized the value of it."[13]
- band were divided by chapman's decision to overly discofy the song...debbie harry walked up to him and said its working. other weren't sure. stein and harry were always together
- depending on when it was decided...title was inspired by 1976 german film [14]
- " "Actually, 'Heart of Glass' was a song we used to play at the punk clubs in New York, long before we cut our first record. We were fooling around in the recording studio and decided to put a disco beat behind it. We were going to call it 'The Disco Song' because it was our first disco song, but then we decided that was kind of stupid. We got the title 'Heart of Glass' from a German movie. We did the song just for fun. It was actually an accident that it turned up on the album."[15]
- "It was based around a Roland Rhythm Machine and the backing took over ten hours to get down. We spent three hours just getting the bass drum. It was the hardest song to do on the album and took us the longest in studio hours"[16]
- "We did it as a novelty item to put more diversity into the album (Parallel Lines). We thought "Picture This" and "Pretty Baby" would be the big hits in the States. Naturally, we were proven wrong... I suppose we should be concerned with the disappointment of our fans. But if they're that strict that they'll get concerned because we do a song like "Heart of Glass", I can't have much sympathy for them."[18]
- "Since then, of course, they've notched up hit after hit ... and have left behind their rougher, punkier material for the cleverly-conceived pop of Parallel Lines. Heart Of Glass was a marvellous example, disco-drumming, missing beats, unusual guitar playing and all.[19]
- When we recorded it for Parallel Lines we were really into Kraftwork, and we wanted to make it more electronic. We weren't thinking disco as we were doing it; we thought it was more electro-European.here
Composition and lyrics edit
- Play-by-play of entire song incl. vocal stylings.
- parody of disco "drummer Clem Burke still managing to crowbar some Ringo-like rolls between the electronic throbs" [20]
- influences--kraftwerk[21] (mainly synthesiser sounds--recording section?)/talking heads
- lyric meaning--"some girls just walk away", autobiographical lyric about a defunct love affair [22]
- "pain in the ass" controversy[23]
- wrong beat -- to "screw people on the dance floor"
- The refrain was "Pain in the ass... Pain in the ass," but at the last minute - in the studio - to make it more commercial and acceptable for airplay, we changed it to "Heart of Glass."..."Heart of Glass" also provided the hook that the song needed.[24]
Release edit
According to the band and Chapman, the executives at Chrysalis did not see a single hit on Parallel Lines. The band members, who harry insists had recorded "Heart of Glass" as a "novelty item to put more diversity on the album", were wary that Blondie "would get tagged with the disco thing" because of the song. Fearful of an anti-disco backlash from Blondie's core fan-base upon hearing the record, the band buried the track in the middle of the album. Further, the band scheduled the "Heart of Glass" single to be released months after Parallel Lines was out.
- Chrysalis executives didn't see a hit single.
- PL was going like this and none of the previous singles made an impact on the Hot 100.
- delayed single and buried within the album[25] too because they didn't want ppl to think they'd gone disco; it was a novelty thing, to put diversity on the record.here
- intial release formats, dates...blah. The long version of "Heart Of Glass" on the 12" single was different from that offered on the 7" or LP, while on the flipside was a disco instrumental version of the song. [26]
- tour
- chart history:performance in europe, britain; had it already been releaed/topped the charts around europe before america. when did it peak america, much after debut?
- they found out that it had peaked the Hot 100 when they were on tour in Milan. theny thy got drunk.
- both sides of the atlantic "transatlantic chart-topper" hits Number 1 in Britain, January 27, 1979... three weeks in Britain. straightup pop in the Uk, while far-out New wave in conservative America.[27] After this hit, PL came into Top Ten after 35 weeks, a then-record.
- when they came back warhol threw them a party(?). "his fave band"[28]
- sales?1m in UK--press release, find better 1,180,000 copies [29] all-time best selling British single in 1979. jan 15 [30] 2 million selling (where?)
Reception edit
- critical reception
- that one quote previewing the album that said it probably wont be successful?
- nme, melody maker[32], rs...
- search for PL album reviews
- went mainstream/cultural phenomenon; original fan-base branded them sell-outs[33] and punk scene disowned them.
- finally big in the US, who ignored their earlier work. Mindless cries of "sell-out" greeted the "Heart of Glass" breakthrough [34]
- gained her a sex symbol status which pissed everybody off; Blondie is a person [35]...new hairstyle, "look" [36]
- disco was officially acceptable on radio [37]
Legacy edit
- AMG, and other present reviewers[38][39]
- blended dance and rock, a combination of the like not seen since Bowie. [40] Two years ago Blondie broke the tacit enmity between new wave rock and disco music with "Heart of Glass."[41]
- "Instead of continuing to work on their refined naive pop concept, they picked up whatever seemed trendy, put it through the Blondie catalyst mill and spit it out again as their alleged original invention. Basically, this formula only worked well on one occasion, with "Heart Of Glass"; they made the disco sound and rhythm work in an inimitable sort of way.
Eventually, not even Debbie sounded like Blondie anymore. Mike Chapman, who had been the co-producer for groups like Sweet, Mud and similarly sticky teenage-bubblegum in the early Seventies, certainly helped turn Blondie into a characterless hit factory when he moved into a position to do so."[42]
- influence--comments by artists--madonna?
- remixes by other artists, samples
- remixes by blondie, comilations, live show(separate section??--acoustic version after reunion)[43]
Accolades edit
acclaimed music
Break edit
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