Deborah Ann "Debbie" Harry (born July 1, 1945) is an American singer-songwriter and actress, most famous for being the lead singer for the punk rock/New Wave band Blondie. She has also had some success as a solo artist. In the mid-1990s she also performed and recorded as part of the Jazz Passengers. Harry has also engaged in an acting career with over 30 film roles and several television appearances to her credit.

Life and early career

Harry was adopted when she was three months old by Catherine and Richard Smith Harry, gift shop proprietors from Hawthorne, New Jersey. She attended Hawthorne High School, where she graduated in 1963. Prior to starting her singing career she moved to New York in the late 1960s and worked as a secretary at BBC Radio's New York office for one year. Later, she was a waitress at Max's Kansas City, and worked in a Dunkin' Donuts, after which she was a dancer in Union City, and a Playboy Bunny.

She began her musical career with a folk rock group, The Wind in the Willows. Harry then joined a girl-group trio, The Stilettos, in the early 1970s. The Stilettos' backup band included her eventual boyfriend and Blondie guitarist, Chris Stein. Harry and Stein formed the band Blondie in the mid-1970s, naming it for the wolf whistle men often yelled at Harry from passing cars. Blondie quickly became regulars at Max's Kansas City and CBGB's in New York City. After a debut album in 1976, commercial success followed in the late 1970s to the early 1980s, first in Australia and Europe, then in the United States.

Blondie

Debbie Harry performing in Toronto
Photo: Jean-Luc Ourlin With her two-tone bleach-blonde hair, Harry quickly became a recognizable icon of punk style. Her look was further popularized by the band's early presence in the music video revolution of the era. She was a continued regular at Studio 54 and was associated with Andy Warhol. The clip for "Rapture" appeared within the first 24 hours of MTV's launch. In June 1979, Blondie graced the cover of Rolling Stone. Harry's stage persona of cool sexuality and streetwise style became so closely associated with the group's name that many came to believe the singer's name to be "Blondie". The difference between the individual Harry and the band Blondie was famously highlighted with a "Blondie is a Group" button campaign by the band in 1979. To complicate matters further, Harry sometimes described her character in the band as being named "Blondie", as in this quote from the No Exit tour book: cquote: Hi, it's Deb. You know, when I woke up this morning I had a realization about myself. I was always Blondie. People always called me Blondie, ever since I was a little kid. What I realized is that at some point I became Dirty Harry. I couldn't be Blondie anymore, so I became Dirty Harry.

Through 1976 and 1977, Blondie released their first two albums to varying success outside the US. However, 1978's Parallel Lines (US #6, UK #1) shot the group to international success, and included the smash hit single "Heart of Glass". The release of Eat to the Beat (US #12, UK #1) in 1979 and Autoamerican (US #7, UK #3) in 1980 continued the band's run of hits, including "Atomic", "The Tide Is High", "Rapture" and the #1 single "Call Me" from the film soundtrack American Gigolo.