Pat Benatar

Patricia Mae Giraldo (née Andrzejewski; formerly and still professionally Benatar ; born January 10, 1953) is an American singer and songwriter. In the US, she has two multi-platinum albums, five platinum albums, and 15 US Billboard top 40 singles, while in Canada she had eight straight platinum albums, and has sold over 36 million albums worldwide. She is a four-time Grammy Award winner. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2022.

Benatar's debut album, In the Heat of the Night (1979), was her breakthrough in North America, especially Canada, where it reached No. 3 on the album chart. Two hit singles from the album were: "Heartbreaker"; and "We Live for Love", the latter written by her lead guitarist and future husband, Neil Giraldo. Her second album, Crimes of Passion (1980), was her most successful work, peaking at No. 2 in North America and France, being certified 4× and 5× platinum in the US and Canada, respectively. The single "Hit Me with Your Best Shot" reached the top 10 in the US and Canada, and is her signature song. Her third album, Precious Time (1981) topped the US Album Chart, and became her first top 10 album in Australia. Its single "Fire and Ice" charted highly in the US and Canada. Benatar's fourth album, Get Nervous (1982), sold less well than her previous two albums, but included the North American hit "Shadows of the Night".

Benatar's sound moved towards more atmospheric pop. The single "Love Is a Battlefield" (1983) was her biggest hit in most countries, reaching No. 1 in the Netherlands, Australia, the US Rock Tracks chart, and No. 5 on the US Hot 100. The live album it came from, Live from Earth (1983), was her biggest seller in Australia, Germany, and the Netherlands. Her fifth album was Tropico (1984), and its lead single "We Belong" reached the top 10 in several countries, including No. 5 on the US Hot 100. Benatar's sixth album, Seven the Hard Way (1985), sold less well, but yielded two singles harking back to the rock vein: "Invincible", a top 10 hit in North America; and "Sex as a Weapon". Her follow-up seventh album, Wide Awake in Dreamland (1988), marked a resurgence in sales in Canada and Australia, and was her highest charting album in the UK. Its rocker, "All Fired Up", was a significant hit in Canada, Australia and the US. Benatar released four additional albums between 1991 and 2003: True Love (1991), Gravity's Rainbow (1993), Innamorata (1997), and Go (2003).

Early life

Patricia Mae Andrzejewski was born on January 10, 1953, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York City. Her mother, Mildred (née Knapp; 1928–2016), was a beautician, and her father, Andrew (Andrzej) Andrzejewski (1926–2009), was a sheet metal worker. Andrew was of Polish descent and Mildred was of German, English, and Irish ancestry. Her family moved to North Hamilton Avenue in Lindenhurst, New York, a village in the Long Island town of Babylon.

Andrzejewski trained as a coloratura with plans to attend the Juilliard School, but decided instead to pursue health education at Stony Brook University. At 19, after one year at Stony Brook, she dropped out to marry her first husband, high school sweetheart Dennis Benatar, a U.S. Army draftee who trained at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, then served with the Army Security Agency at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, before being stationed at Fort Lee, Virginia, starting in 1973. Pat worked as a bank teller near Richmond, Virginia.

Career

Career beginnings

Benatar quit her job to pursue a singing career after being inspired by a Liza Minnelli concert she saw in Richmond, Virginia. Benatar had a gig at a Holiday Inn and got a job as a singing waitress at a nightclub named the Roaring Twenties. At the Roaring Twenties, she met and formed a duo with pianist Phil Coxon, which soon expanded to a ten-person lounge band called Coxon's Army, a regular at Sam Miller's basement club. The band gained in popularity and was the subject of a never-aired PBS special; its bassist Roger Capps was later the original bass player for the Pat Benatar Band. The period also yielded Benatar's first single: "Day Gig" (1974), written and produced by Coxon and given a limited local release. Her last significant gig in Richmond was a two-hour performance at Thomas Jefferson High School.

Dennis was discharged from the Army and the couple moved to New York in May 1975 so Benatar could pursue a singing career. She performed at an amateur night at the comedy club Catch a Rising Star in New York. Benatar's rendition of Judy Garland's "Rock-a-Bye Your Baby With a Dixie Melody" earned her a callback by club owner Rick Newman, who then became her manager; Benatar became a regular performer at Catch a Rising Star for the next three years. In late 1975, she landed the part of Zephyr in Harry Chapin's futuristic rock musical, The Zinger, which ran for a month in 1976 at the Performing Arts Foundation's (PAF) Playhouse in Huntington Station, Long Island.

Halloween 1977 proved a pivotal night in Benatar's early, spandexed stage persona. She entered a Halloween contest at the Cafe Figaro in Greenwich Village dressed as a character from the film Cat-Women of the Moon. Later that evening, Benatar went onstage at Catch a Rising Star still in costume. Between appearances at Catch a Rising Star, she recorded commercial jingles for Pepsi-Cola and a number of regional brands. Benatar headlined New York City's Tramps nightclub over four days in spring 1978, where her performance was heard by representatives from several record companies. Benatar was signed to Chrysalis Records by co-founder Terry Ellis the following week. She and Dennis divorced shortly after, although Benatar kept his surname.

1979–1981: In the Heat of the Night and Crimes of Passion

Benatar's debut album, In the Heat of the Night, was released in August 1979, but only debuted on the US Billboard 200 album chart in October, eventually peaking at number 12 in the US in March 1980. Mike Chapman produced three tracks on the album, while engineer Peter Coleman oversaw the rest. In addition, Chapman and his songwriting partner, Nicky Chinn, wrote three songs that appear on the LP: "In the Heat of the Night" and "If You Think You Know How to Love Me" which were previously recorded by Smokie, and a rearranged version of a song they wrote for Sweet, "No You Don't". The album also featured two songs written by Roger Capps and her; "I Need a Lover", written by John Mellencamp; and "Don't Let It Show", written by Alan Parsons and Eric Woolfson.

The album was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America in December 1980. Canada became the album's most successful market as it certified 4× Platinum there with chart peak of number 3 on the RPM albums chart. While it was a moderate success in Australia, reaching number 25, and very successful in New Zealand, reaching number 8, it barely made the Top 100 in the UK. Unusual for an English-language album, its most successful European market was France where it went to number 20.

"If You Think You Know How to Love Me" was the first single to be released on September 14, 1979. However, it was unsuccessful. Her second single "Heartbreaker" was released on October 26, 1979, and became a sleeper hit, eventually climbing to number 23 in the US, number 16 in Canada and number 14 in New Zealand. It was later listed at No. 72 on VH1's list of the Greatest Hard Rock songs of all time. A third single "We Live for Love", which was written by her future husband Neil Giraldo, was released in February 1980, and became her first Top 10 hit anywhere by reaching number 8 in Canada, while reaching number 27 in the US, number 26 in New Zealand, and number 28 in Australia, her first hit there.

In August 1980, she released her second LP, Crimes of Passion, featuring her signature song "Hit Me with Your Best Shot" along with the controversial song "Hell Is for Children." The lyrics of the song discuss things that child abusers tell their victims, such as, "Tell Grandma you fell off the swing." Benatar was inspired by reading a series of articles in The New York Times about child abuse in America. "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" (US number 9) was her first single to break the US Top 10 and sold more than one million copies (Gold status) in the United States. It was also a Top 10 hit in Canada and a moderate hit in Australia, where it reached number 33. The album peaked for five consecutive weeks at number 2 in the US in January 1981 (behind John Lennon's and Yoko Ono's Double Fantasy) and a month later, she won her first Grammy Award for "Best Female Rock Vocal Performance" of 1980 for the album.