After 30 years, Blondie is still a hit

Houston Chronicle ^ | 8/19/09 | Ken Hoffman

[pissant]

In the early 1990s, drummer Clem Burke, his band Blondie broken up in bitterness, was walking by the future site of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. They were just pouring the concrete slab.

“I was doing a gig in Cleveland — I was playing in a band called the Romantics at the time. I remember I was drinking a beer and walking by the construction site. I tossed the bottle into the foundation. I thought that's as close to the Hall of Fame as I'll ever get,” Burke said.

But in 2006, Blondie, one of the great innovative bands in American rock, was back together, finally nominated and inducted on their first ballot into the Hall of Fame.

It might have been one of the most stressful and uncomfortable inductions ever. Singer Deborah Harry, Burke and the rest of Blondie, plus two former band members, were invited on stage. When it was time for Blondie to perform its greatest hits, the two former members asked Harry if they could play, too.

Harry refused. No way. And shooed them away. The two ex-mates made a stink on national television. It was a wonderfully creepy rock ' n' roll moment.

The dispatched members learned that when you leave a band and file a lawsuit, maybe the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony isn't the time to make nice.

[dfwgator]

I'd go back to around 1968.