Concert Review: Blondie at the Crossroads

According to Wikipedia, Deborah Harry, lead singer for the new wave band Blondie, which played last night at the Crossroads KC at Grinders, turned 64 this past July 1. Damnit, Wikipedia, where are your manners? If this is correct, and I have a feeling it is — the great and powerful AllMusic.com backs it up — then Harry was 30, or close to it, when she and guitarist Chris Stein founded their band in 1975.

Can you imagine a 30-year-old female American musician doing this today and having anywhere near the kind of success Harry did? I needn’t go on about contemporary society’s obsession with splaying out and dissecting youth and beauty, paparrazi-blog commenters taking apart female celebrities on computer screens like fetal pigs. And when Harry began, first as a Playboy Club cocktailing “Bunny” who played in bands, she came on fully sexual — even more so with Blondie. Just watch the video for “Denis.” Gee willakers!

Times have changed, and last night at the Crossroads, fans came more for nostalgia than for lust. And they were greeted by a classy, bouncy dame and her backing band, who, if not as nimble as they were 30 years ago, were still rarin’ to have a good time.

Unfortunately, things got off to a mighty shaky start with “Call Me,” the band’s biggest-selling single, which was featured on the American Gigolo soundtrack and — get this — and is a favorite pep tune among American high school marching bands. You’d think, given these stakes, the soundman would’ve made sure Harry’s microphone were turned up loud enough before she began singing the verse. Instead, it wasn’t until the chorus — or until the second or third song of the night, depending on whom you ask — that her vocals could compete with the crashing of her six-piece band and the noise of a thousand or so moderately wylin’ out fans.