The first time I saw Blondie in 1979 they weren’t to be honest much cop. Whether it was their recreational habits or the rigours of touring I don’t know, but Debbie’s voice was shot and the boys looked like they’d much rather have been at home in New York.
The 2011 incarnation of the band couldn’t be any more on the money, with the opening ‘Union City Blue’, ‘Dreaming’ and ‘Atomic’ – apparently our hair is particularly beautiful tonight – as powerful as statements of intent get.
This is an exercise in nostalgia, sure, but a dignified one, which belies the fact that Ms. Harry and fellow founder members Chris Stein and Clem Burke have a combined age of 183.
Resplendent in a billowing taffeta dress, marine blue shrug cardie, 5” wedge heels and bobbed peroxide wig, she still plays the flirty Marilyn role to perfection. Completing the line-up are two young-ish guns on bass and rhythm and a neon-smocked keys man who looks like he’s escaped from Zoolander.
After a pristine ‘Hanging On The Telephone’, messed up at the start ‘Call Me’ – “It’s my fault,” Debbie purrs, “I was concentrating on you beautiful people instead of the song” – and mass singalong ‘Maria’, it’s time for the obligatory plugging of the new album, which to Panic Of Girls’ credit doesn’t prompt the usual mass exodus to the bar.
The delicate ‘Cheap China Shoes’, plaintive ‘Mother’ and electro-flavoured ‘Twist’ aren’t going to make it on to any future Best Of… but neither are they filler.
The only real misfire is their cover of Sophia George’s 1985 pop reggae hit, ‘Girlie Girlie’, which was designed to be sung by a teenager not a pensioner, even one as cool as this.
The band are quickly back on track though with a super-funky ‘Rapture’, which seamlessly segues into the Beasties’ ‘(You’ve Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party)’.
A pounding ‘One Way Or Another’ reminds us of Blondie’s CBGBs roots, while ‘Heart Of Glass’ demonstrates how quickly they moved away from punk/new wave orthodoxy.
There was just time to beat the crap out of The Damned’s ‘New Rose’ – I’d really hate to be Clem’s snare – and then it was off into the for once balmy Dublin night.
The campaign to bring Blondie back for Electric Picnic starts here.