In 1981, the band Blondie topped the Billboard charts with the song “Rapture.” The song hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 on March 28, 1981, and stayed there for two weeks.
The song, written by bandmates Debbie Harry and Chris Stein, appeared on the 1980 album Autoamerican, which previously featured the No. 1 hit "The Tide Is High.”
Unlike the reggae-tinged “The Tide Is High,” “Rapture” took inspiration from New York's burgeoning underground rap scene—and it was one of the first mainstream pop songs to feature a section of rap vocals. Heavy rotation on MTV also gave the song a huge audience.
The lyrics to "Rapture" feature a nod to pioneering NYC rapper Fab 5 Freddy (Freddy Brathwaite), who also appeared in a street scene in the music video.
While Sugarhill Gang’s 1979 song “Rapper’s Delight” is often credited with bringing the rap/hip-hop genre to a mainstream audience, Harry once noted that her song was the first No. 1 to do so.
“We had the first number on,” Harry told Westchester magazine. “I put quotes around ‘rap,’ because it’s not strictly or truly a rap song; it’s an homage. We really loved what was going on. We were at a street level at the time, and we saw the kids doing what they did and what it meant, and I felt like, This is really important stuff. This is giving a voice to a lot of kids.’”
“Up until then, the only outlet for Black musicians was R&B, so this was major!” she added. “In a way, I felt that maybe I was taking advantage of a situation. It was a gamble; we had no idea that it would go to number one. I’m proud of the fact that we did the first rap song that had its own music.”
In a separate interview with The Current, Harry said she felt “very fortunate” to be under the influence of Grandmaster Flash and the Funky Four Plus One More.
“Up until that time, rap did not have its own songs, it usually just used rhythm tracks from other artists like Chic, with scratching and turntables,” she noted. “When we did ’Rapture,’ we built rap into and around the song, so I think that was our contribution to the whole thing."
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Debbie Harry called ‘Rapture’ a ‘breath of fresh air’
In “Rapture”, Harry performs a half-spoken-word, half-rapped verse after singing other parts of the song.
The Blondie frontwoman told Dazed Digital that the song captures the full essence of her band, also known for hits such as ”Call Me,” “One Way or Another,” and “Heart of Glass.”
“What happens in ‘Rapture’ is very comprehensive,” Harry explained. “It took a form of music that was, or still is, very modern and can be very political. Rap and hip-hop songs back then didn’t have their own songs. Rappers would just rap on somebody else’s music. [‘Rapture’] was crafted specifically for that rap. Until then, that hadn’t been done. It was a breath of fresh air.”
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