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Blondie music biography continued...

the remnants of Harry's previous group, the Stilettos. The lineup fluctuated over the next year. Drummer Clement Burke joined in May 1975. Bassist Gary Valentine joined in August. In October, keyboard player James Destri joined, to complete the initial permanent lineup. They released their first album, Blondie, on Private Stock Records in December 1976. In July 1977, Valentine was replaced by Frank Infante. The band broke in the U.K. market with their sophomore effort, Plastic Letters, but it was the release of their third album, Parallel Lines, in 1978 that garnered them worldwide attention. "Picture This" became a U.K. Top 40 hit, and "Hanging on the Telephone" made the U.K. Top Ten, but it was the album's third single, the disco-influenced "Heart of Glass," that took Blondie to number one in both the U.K. and the U.S. "Sunday Girl" hit number one in the U.K. in May, and "One Way or Another" hit the U.S. Top 40 in August. The album ultimately went platinum, as did two follow-up efforts, Eat to the Beat, and Autoamerican, which contained such hit Blondie songs as "The Tide is High" and "Rapture."
These albums lent an international recognition factor for bleached-blond lead singer Deborah Harry, new wave's answer to Marilyn Monroe, according to Rolling Stone magazine. "Blondie's repertoire, most of it written by Harry and boyfriend Chris Stein, was always on the melodic side of punk and grew increasingly eclectic, trademarked mostly by Harry's deadpan delivery," it noted. Blondie broke up in October 1982, with Deborah Harry launching a part-time solo career while caring for Stein, who was fighting a serious illness that he eventually recovered from. In 1998, the original lineup of Harry, Stein, Destri, and Burke reunited to tour Europe, their first series of dates in 16 years; this followed two more marginally successful releases. In 2006, Blondie celebrated their 30th anniversary with an induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a testament to their status as musical survivors.