Of all the Ladies of the Eighties, one stands alone as the most bellicose, sanguine, and pugilistic to ever walk around in Day-Glo Spandex and a headband. I’m talking, of course, about Margaret Thatcher.
No, it was Pat Benatar, who fought on the battlefield of love, wielded sex as a weapon like a V2 or a spear, could take a haymaker and brush it off, and declared herself invincible. Non-fans like me tend to think of her—when we think about her at all—as a second-tier (and second-rate) rocker. Truth is, she recorded two multi-platinum albums, five platinum albums, and 15 US Billboard top 40 singles.
Turns out she was invincible after all.
And while her hipness quotient was in the tank, there’s no denying she had a voice that could send small woodland creatures sailing and released a small handful of songs that make even Benatar haters stand up and say, “Holy Midde of the Road!” Naturally, very few of them are willing to admit it.
Benatar wasn’t treated kindly by the critics either. Village Voice smartass Robert Christgau wrote, “…she shows about as much aesthetic principle as Don Kirshner. Though she does have a better voice than Kirshner.” And he called her “Cher without innocence, chutzpah, acting ability, or “Gypsys, Tramps, and Thieves…”
Others were more ambivalent–Chuck Eddy, who put Benatar’s 1987 compilation Best Shots at exactly the halfway mark in his book Stairway to Hell: The 500 Best Heavy Metal Albums in the Universe, called it “one righteously spandexed AOR-junk watershed,” managing to praise and damn her at the same time.
Benatar did most of her sparring at the borderline of kitsch, as befits an artist who was inspired to take up a singing career after attending a Liza Minelli concert in Richmond, Virginia. She was Patty Smythe, not Patti Smith, and more Debbie Gibson than Debbie Harry.
Still, there was no ignoring those “pipes of solid brass” or her sub-Joan Jett bad attitude, even if her music had an undeniable theatrical bent—many of her songs are one short step from musical theater, especially after she discovered MTV, softened her sound, and adopted dance routines in an attempt to keep up with the likes of Madonna.
It doesn’t surprise me that Benatar got her start in musical theater, appearing pre-fame in Harry Chapin’s 1976 futuristic morality musical The Zinger, which I strongly recommend to Harry Chapin’s six surviving fans. But Benatar fans didn’t care. Back in the day, when Benatar was on top, I thought her fans were beyond all human aid, but I was wrong. Benatar came through on occasion, with a couple of songs that even I have come to believe are great.
But by couple, I mean a couple, and the problem with the 15-cut Best Shots is this—15 US Billboard top 40 singles notwithstanding, Best Shots is nine or so songs too long, and it makes my teeth hurt to think there are Benatar best-of compilations out there that are twice as long.
Benatar is a prime candidate for The Winning Combinations series, a compilation format released by Universal Special Products (and sometimes A&M Records) featuring two major rock acts on a single CD, each with five tracks (see Foghat and Humble Pie).
To my way of thinking, this would capture all of the songs a soft-on-Benatar listener needs. My candidates for bands to couple Pat Benatar with include Sammy Hagar, Bonnie Tyler, Billy Squier, Lita Ford, and Bryan Adams. Message to Universal Special Products–get off your lazy asses and give us the perfect Pat Benatar Greatest Hits!
I’d put “Love Is a Battlefield”—despite the melodrama—on that hypothetical Universal Special Products mini-compilation because it has real dance appeal and shows off Benatar’s supernatural vocal cords. It’s hardly my fave, but if David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance” is a “classic,” then so is this one.
“Hit Me with Your Best Shot” is pugilistic gold and one of the two best songs Benatar ever recorded. It’s melodic, boasts a great guitar solo, and features Benatar at her TKO-belter best. It’s as good as anything Debbie Harry ever sang, and I’ll bet you Joan Jett was green with envy.
“Heartbreaker” is the other song, and while her vocals on the verses are a bit too “nice,” she makes up for it on the choruses. The song itself is all hard rock, take-no-shit aggression, and the perfect vehicle for Benatar’s message—you may be a heartbreaker, but don’t mess around with me.
“Shadows of the Night” is gospel-flavored shlock, but the synth-rock approach works, and Benatar delivers a death-to-ladies’-men performance. “Shadows” reminds me of a Meatloaf song—it’s bombastic and over-baked, but with a melody that’s a real keeper.
The last song on my hypothetical Universal Special Products five-songer was difficult to decide on, and not because I had too many options. “All Fired Up” is the loudest and meanest song on Best Shots, all brutalistic and amps turned to 11 savagery, but there’s a disconnect between its metal machine music and Benatar’s vocals. So I finally went with “We Belong,” a Madonna-school power ballad with a suck-you-in melody that may be pure treacle but is treacle of the highest order.
The rest of the songs on Very Best—and I’m not prepared to discuss them all—mostly have inadmissible deficiencies and leave me cold. The studio version of “Hell Is for Children” is too reserved, despite the hard rock guitar on the choruses.
The live version that appears later (talk about padding) hits twice as hard but is, unfortunately, tacked on minor-medley-style to the opener “Suffer the Little Children,” which (if you ask me) is abuse-of-children overkill. Still, the Benatar on the live version is twice as animated and electrifying, and the part where the song speeds up and Benatar goes full banshee proves she had hard rock cred.
“Invincible” has Phil Collins-strength drums, but its synthpop leanings put me off; despite its hard rock and Benatar’s incendiary vocals, “Fire and Ice” has a distracting showbiz sheen to it.
On “We Live for Love,” Benatar apes Debbie Harry, by which I mean she sounds exactly like Debbie Harry. It’s supernatural. Was she desperate for a hit? We’ll never know because Benatar never released it as a single. “One Love (Song of the Lion”) is a synthpop menace—Benatar sounds like she’s trying to out-Duran Duran. Talk about your suicide missions!
Songs that should be on the compilation: “You Better Run,” Benatar’s cover of “Helter Skelter,” “Sex as a Weapon,” her cover of Nick Gilder’s “Don’t Walk Away,” and the powerhouse “No You Don’t.” Best Shots pulls its punches and suffers accordingly
Pat Benatar had some of the strongest pipes in rock and roll, but she also had a weakness for histrionics—she carried Broadway with her everywhere she went. She was the female Meatloaf.
But for all that, she also gave us immortal songs like “Hit Me with Your Best Shot” and “Heartbreaker.” I didn’t like Pat Benatar back in the day, and I don’t much like her now. But please don’t tell her. Something tells me her best shot is better than mine.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
C-
