Pat Benatar: The Ultimate Poll

Easily "Shadows of the Night," the ultimate in "Let's stick together, 1980s geeks!" anthems. "Cause we got nobody else" always breaks my heart.

A lot of dreck after "Sex As A Weapon," though.

All Fired Up is the last good one. It's amazing how many good songs she has though. She was a hitmaker.

Precious Time is my favorite right now.

"Promises in the Dark" seems like the best one to me, but there are plenty of winners from those first few albums.

I absolutely love "Invisible," which sounded weird and dated in 1985: one of those oldster attempts at New Wave, filtered through eighties triumphalism. In fact, it's better than "Eye of the Tiger" (there, I said it).

I forgot how odd "We Live For Love" is.

I'm just happy to see any love at all for her here. I don't think she gets enough love, though I can see how it's possible to overrate her, too. I've got a DVD at home of a whole bunch of her videos, I'd like to watch that soon.

I don't have a clue what to choose in this poll, though. Yikes.

I want to vote for "We Belong" because it's great and is likely to be overlooked, but "Love Is A Battlefield" came up on shuffle the other day and it wrecked me and so I voted for that.

Alfred, did you mean "Invincible"? Not one of my faves, but hey.

"Heartbreaker." Then "Hit Me With Your Best Shot." First two albums were best. And there are definitely less bloated best-of sets out there than this one.

how odd "We Live For Love" is.

I just always thought of it as her Blondie-disco move.

"Never again...isn't that what you said..."

Yeah, "Invincible."

I can't even hum "La Bel Age" or "Ooh Ooh Song."

The later is all humming anyway.

latter

The last line of this Xgau review always bugged me:

Best Shots [Chrysalis, 1989]
Does anyone remember anymore that she was originally a "cabaret" act? Does anyone remember anymore that early on she was sold as "new wave"? Cher without innocence, chutzpah, acting ability, or "Gypsys, Tramps, and Thieves," she finally semiretired to family life. This best-of is her artistic legacy. I'm sure she's a good mom--pretty sure, anyway. C

Well, she ain't Chrissie Hynde.

i.e. she's been rated exactly right over the years.

Chrissie Hynde ain't no Chrissie Hynde either.

But the dig at her motherhood skills? ELP got off better than that with worse grades.

"Shadows Of The Night" is awesome lyrically, but fails due to excess of Springsteen.

My inner Alex in NYC knows the correct answer is "Hell Is For Children"... yet somehow I am compelled to vote for "We Belong".

"Le Bel Age" is the ringer, for its best use of melodic snatches of "The Kids Are Alright" since "The Kids Are Alright"...

Oh wait. "Promises In The Dark"

I'm still all about "We Belong" -- though the whistling on the ending of "Love is a Battlefield" still gets me.

her career-long claim of four and half octaves has always bugged me. I mean she has crazy range, no question. but four and a half octaves sounds like a little gilding of the lily. anybody know if it was ever substantiated?

trying to find out I found this awesome 20/20 puff/profile on her

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aElVaRXHY2g&feature=related

outstanding one-two punch on the YouTube comments thread for the "We Belong" video

helmuthoorn (10 hours ago) Show Hide
0 Poor comment Good comment
Marked as spam
Reply | Spam
Being a 49 yr old Dutch reverend I'm not really into popmusic, but this touches me. It's nearly allways on my mind when baptizing babies.

nickka2008 (16 hours ago) Show Hide
0 Poor comment Good comment
Marked as spam
Reply | Spam
I love your comment helmuthoorn. Praise be to our Eternal God

Somebody should play the good Reverend "Hell Is For Children"

Yeah - the dig at her motherhood skills? In a record review? WTF? That's pure misogyny right there, folks. I'd like to see a review about a man that questions his ability to be a good father.

fails due to excess of Springsteen

LOL

this thread is basically how I'm coping with my hangover today

pretty awesome (the parts you can hear: annoying canned laughter/dialogue throughout) PB singing "We've Only Just Begun" (!) accompanied only by acoustic guitar here

She's another one of those eighties artists (Rick Springfield, Corey Hart) who had lots of Top 40 hits no one's heard in 20 years.

re: the Springsteen thing, it's really just the chorus, which is just smeared all over with mid-80s radio-hit Landau butter.

Which is a goddamn shame, since the turns that end each verse are sublime. DL Byron, I hope you're still dining out on the royalties.

Low-fat or regular butter?

xx-post^^ I know I'd rather hear "Love Somebody" or "Never Surrender" way more than I'd ever want to hear "Jessie's Girl" or "Sunglasses at Night" again.

How did I miss this quite ambitiously-titled album and why is it not on iTunes

1993 -- Gravity's Rainbow -- which is produced by Neil Giraldo and Don Gehman (of R.E.M. and John Mellencamp fame) -- is released. All songs from the release are written or co-written by Giraldo as well. From the dub echoes of "Everybody Lay Down," to the shuffling bar blues of "Crazy" (featuring Giraldo's Hendrix-influenced Wah-Wah guitar), Pat continued to redefine her sound in a 90's context.

I had a roommate who would listen to Gravity's Rainbow all the time when it came out. I was NOT a fan in 1993, and I'm pretty sure I'd still hate it now.

Even worse: Her "blues" album a few years later:

http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/patbenatar/albums/album/132734/review/5944846/true_love

(I think I actually was nicer to that one than it deserved, though.)

(And duh, 1991 is before 1993, not after.)

Her daughter looks just like her, minus the post-modern haircut:

http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/53250855.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=17A4AD9FDB9CF1939847EC77F5F8D1CE4060A6015711AC91A40A659CEC4C8CB6

Low-fat or regular butter?

http://sfmcclures.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/plugra.jpg

that butter rocks!

High fat content ftw!

There's a reason That Landau Sound dominated rock radio playlists post-Born In The USA... but it's very rich and best enjoyed in small portions.

does anyone here OWN Tropico or Seven the Hard Way?

That picture of her daughter looks like a mug shot of some girl who got picked up for assault at a honky tonk bar.

She gets a little love from the early-20s hipster contingent here, with her stuff on one or two jukeboxes that I've noticed. I don't really get it, but then I'm not in love with "Eye of the Tiger" either.

"We Belong."

here = Seattle

"hit me with your best shot" is THE pat benatar song, but i've loved "heartbreaker" since i was 10 years old and nothing has ever supplanted it.

Chuck I gotta give you props, I generally don't enjoy reading pan reviews (because I am Mr. Positivity obv) but I thought that was right on and I loved reading it.

I'm going to need to hear that Benatar/Giraldo "Please Come Home For Christmas"...

how odd "We Live For Love" is.

I just always thought of it as her Blondie-disco move.

Considering that Mike Chapman produced her first album, then yes.

As much as I think of her as one of the quintessential 80s rocker riding the new wave train (see also Tom Petty - who also had a drummer who's better than you realize), I gotta admit that her run of singles up through 1986 or so is pretty much unstoppable.

I've always liked "Little Too Late." It sounds like it's a cover of something the Music Machine or the Shadows Of Knight would have done.

see also Tom Petty - who also had a drummer who's better than you realize

Mellencamp too, surely. Unless we just always realized his drummer was that good.

Kenny Aronoff? Hells yeah !

Kenny Aronoff is not screwing around. Listen to Lonely Ol' Night for proof.

In the Heat Of The Night should be in the Pat Benatar pantheon. Man that is a good one.

Oh shit, people. Look.

John D. knows this thread. John D. told what the winner was but you all didn't listen to him. Damn you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3O2JGB0xXs

Listen to John D. this is the end of Pat Benatar, this is it.

Oh my god Elvis Telecom is on this thread.

Please stop. How can you be mean to me when I love her damn records? It's not fair at all.

http://www.benatarfanclub.com/albums/ptime/ptime.jpg

Alfred, tell these boys to stop! Stop it now. Stop it boys! Stop it!
Pour the wine and stop it!

I like Pat Benatar a lot. I have liked her for over 20 years and if you go back to the start of ILM, 2000-1, I probably liked her more than anyone else on the board. But I don't know the breadth of her work as well as a lot of you do.

I'm going to have to vote for 'Love is a Battlefield' - I adored its video on the Max Headroom show in about 1984-5, loved the little narrative extras: 'You leave this house now! And don't even *think* about coming back!'. But that song aside, I don't really know much of the early work. I do own Tropico on vinyl but didn't get into it. Maybe I could dig it out still. But 'LIAB' still stands up as superb now, for sure. BTW, does anyone remember the sleeve of the 45, PB in hair-raisingly sexy outfit; the B-side 'Here's My Heart' from the rereleased *Metropolis*; or the 12" mix of 'LIAB' itself?

Possibly my favourite of the LPs is Seven The Hard Way - yes, I own that on vinyl, like it a lot, play it sometimes. 'Sex As A Weapon' - and again check out the 12" mix of that (I have the 7" AND the 12" and the LP!?!) Loads of other lovely things on that record including 'Le Bel Age' and especially, I think, 'Run Between The Raindrops'.

I bought Wide Awake In Dreamland when it came out. The record is still on my record player in the other room right now, has been for days. 'I love the excited guitar crescendo just before the drums hit on 'All Fired Up', and I like a lot of the rest of the LP - as a kid, always thought 'Let's Stay Together' was Beatles pastiche; maybe it is, partly. 'Cool Zero' has funny urban-panic lyrics. The riffs on the coda of 'Too Long A Soldier' are nice, to me. 'Cerebral Man' is a very recherché title and I still don't really get it. I like the lead guitar at the very start of 'Suffer Little Children'.

I don't think I own a PB record later than that, though Gravity's Rainbow sounds tantalizingly (though in truth I can't stand the novel), and she did a big interview with The Believer magazine that is worth reading:
http://www.believermag.com/issues/200305/?read=interview_benatar

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

no shit

WTF

standard problem-with-polls result - best-known song wins as voters aren't really familiar with all the candidates

^^^^^

"Invincible" should have swept.

I love Shadows Of The Night, too, don't get me wrong.

Her black curled hair in the Shadows of The Night video just absolutely slays me. I know I said this on ILX somewhere before, but I think it bears repeating.

"We Belong" gets one vote? What in the name of all that is holy?

"Invincible" should have swept.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Sunday, August 17, 2008 10:40 PM (2 years ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drSCtseoNxQ

This song still gives me the goddamn chills.

Big bonus points for shooting the video while pregnant too.

Love the synths on "Invincible." And, boy, does she sell the platitudes.