Music Icon, 80, Blames One Person for Derailing Her Career — 'So Screwed Up'

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Music Icon, 80, Blames One Person for Derailing Her Career — 'So Screwed Up' originally appeared on Parade.

In the early '80s, Blondie became one of the biggest groups in music, dominating the charts with hits like “Heart of Glass” and “Call Me.”

Yet, despite their rapid rise to fame, frontwoman Debbie Harry has long blamed the band’s 1982 downfall on one major factor.

While fans speculated that Blondie fell apart due to the usual culprits — drugs, internal tension or money issues — Harry insists that wasn’t the case.

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“I don’t think that drugs were the real problem in Blondie,” she reportedly once said. “We’d worked for years without a vacation, we were expected to produce a huge amount of material, we didn’t have proper management and we had a bad record deal. I mean, how much can one take?”

Harry has never been shy about pointing fingers at the band’s management, accusing them of placing relentless pressure on the group and giving them no room to explore other creative paths.

“Blondie’s thing was so screwed up,” she told Hot Press in 2019. “We were always under pressure from either management or the record labels, who wanted to know why the new album was taking an extra month to record.”

That pressure took a personal toll. “I wish I’d had the time back then to have a family life,” she added. “But it didn’t seem like the right environment to bring children into and then, well, time ran out.”

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One of her biggest regrets came when she was forced to turn down the role of Pris, the iconic blonde robot in Blade Runner. The part ultimately went to Daryl Hannah — a decision Harry says was made for her by the label.

“My biggest regret of all is turning down the role in Blade Runner,” she admitted to the Daily Mail. “My record company didn’t want me to take time out to do a movie. I shouldn’t have listened to them.”

The role helped launch Hannah’s film career, leading to major projects like Splash with Tom Hanks and Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill: Volume 1.

Now, decades later, Blondie is gearing up to release a new album — but Harry isn’t sure what the future holds.

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Earlier this year, longtime drummer Clem Burke passed away after a battle with cancer, and his absence has left a major void.

“Keeping a rock band together for 50 years was like a marriage,” she told Vanity Fair on June 30.

“And it’s sad that with Clem’s passing and without having Chris onstage, I can’t see myself being onstage as Blondie, even though I am the face of Blondie. But I’m proud of the music, and I would still like to do music.”

Music Icon, 80, Blames One Person for Derailing Her Career — 'So Screwed Up' first appeared on Parade on Jul 3, 2025

This story was originally reported by Parade on Jul 3, 2025, where it first appeared.