Between a Heart and a Rock Place (11 page)

Establishment event or not, I was giddy that night. I “dressed up,” wearing the outfit I would later wear on the cover of
Precious Time
—a purple coat with tight black pants. Although it was televised, the Grammys didn't have the red-carpet fashion show in those days, and no self-respecting musician would have participated if they had. That was just fine by me. My excitement dimmed somewhat when I got there and learned that the category I'd been nominated in, Best Rock Performance, Female, wouldn't be seen on the regular telecast. My whole family was watching.

Even though the rules of rock dictated that I wasn't supposed to act thrilled to be there, I was incredibly proud. More than anything else it showed how far I'd come in such a short time. A little more than two years ago, I'd been singing other people's music at Catch a Rising Star. Now I was there with the giants of the business, in an audience filled with many of the most talented and respected people in the industry. I wasn't starstruck (it's not my way), and while I was awed to be in that seat, I wasn't surprised. This was something I'd been working toward, something I'd planned all along. It was vindication, compensation for all the shit that the label had put us through.

Christopher Cross had historic wins. It was the first time any artist had ever won all four of the general categories: Record and Song of the Year for “Sailing,” Album of the Year, and Best New Artist. Bette Midler won Best Pop Performance, Female, for
The Rose
. There was
a pall over the night, though. The music community was still reeling from John Lennon's death on December 8, 1980.

That had been a horrible day. I had been at home in Tarzana when Myron called and told me the news. I immediately called Spyder, who was mixing a live performance at a studio in Hollywood. We were devastated. I turned on the TV and sat transfixed as the details emerged. This was happening in our peer group, our music community; unlike Elvis, who had died a few years earlier, Lennon was our contemporary. Making things harder was the fact that I adored Lennon. My earliest memories of music were tied to him. He'd been a regular part of my musical life ever since I got that red transistor radio for Christmas. I loved his voice. All throughout high school, as I'd been learning to sing, I'd always felt the impact of how he performed. I don't think there was anyone making music then who wasn't influenced by him (and there probably isn't now). It was an emotional night for everyone who cared about what he'd done for music.

I had a terrible migraine on Grammy night. Flying often gave me awful headaches, and this was no exception. The medication that I took for these headaches was administered with a shot, which had made me sick to my stomach on top of the headache. Before the awards started, I went into the bathroom and threw up. As I crouched there over the toilet, I heard someone else in the bathroom, and it jarred me.

Oh no, what if they think I'm doing drugs? I can hear it now: “Pat Benatar must be an addict—she's throwing up in the bathroom
.”

I came out of the stall to find the previous year's female rock winner, Donna Summer, washing her hands. Donna cast a hard look in my direction.

“Ugh! You're just the person I wanted to see!” she said to me in an exasperated tone.

Oh crap.
I didn't know Donna, had never even met her. What had I done?

“Why?” I asked.

“My kid plays that record of yours every minute of the day! I know every word of it, and to tell you the truth, I'm sick of it!” She said it with a smile.

I had to laugh, thinking of when I was a kid playing the Beatles and my mother had said almost the exact same thing. And it made me feel good knowing that I was pleasing kids and driving parents just a little bit crazy. It was the first time I'd heard someone complain that my music was being played too much.

By the time they announced the nominees for Best Rock Performance, Female, my headache was gone. I think it was the kid in me, the excitement, the anticipation. I was completely caught up in the whole thing. There was something incredibly satisfying about knowing that even after all the crap Chrysalis had done to make life hell, they couldn't spoil this moment. I'd found a way to keep the joy of it all locked away in a safe place, somewhere they couldn't touch. They read the names of the nominees: Grace Slick for
Dreams,
Marianne Faithfull for
Broken English,
Joan Armatrading for
How Cruel,
Linda Ronstadt for “How Do I Make You,” and Pat Benatar for
Crimes of Passion
. They took the winner's envelope and opened it. “And the—”

“Don't be mad if I don't win,” I whispered to Rick.

“—winner is Pat Benatar,
Crimes of Passion
!”

I bolted out of that chair like there was a spring up my butt. I went flying up to the podium, all worries about being seen as a sellout gone. I was so thrilled.

I was hyperventilating. All plans of being übercool and nonchalant vanished as soon as I heard my name. Looking back on it now, I can't remember exactly what I said, but I'm pretty sure I gushed—not exactly Sally Field's “You like me” speech, but probably close. Then, when I walked offstage, I took a real look at the award. It was set on a wooden block, but the little Victrola was plastic. I remember thinking,
Wow, plastic! That's kind of chintzy!

Chintzy, maybe. But thrilling nonetheless.

 

C
RIMES OF
P
ASSION
WAS
still a top ten album in the spring of 1981 when Chrysalis started pushing us to get back into the studio for a new record. It was insane to think that we had to make a third album while the second one was still being promoted. We should have used the leverage we'd gained from
Crimes of Passion,
taken control, and avoided jumping right back into the studio. But once again Chrysalis invoked the suspension clause of our contract. They had the right to request a new record even though we were still promoting the last one. At least we were starting from a small base of material. We had a few songs that had been recorded but not used on the second record that we planned on carrying over to the new project. Unbelievably Chrysalis brought Keith Olsen back in to produce; however, this time they offered Spyder co-production, with producer credit and full pay. While Chrysalis had fought us every step of the way about giving Spyder credit, the irony was that they saw the talent that he had for producing. They loved his actual input, which was why it was so mystifying that they didn't want to acknowledge his contribution. Depending on how you looked at it, this was either a peace offering or a consolation prize, but it didn't hurt that he got his own attorney.

Even still, there was a lot of tension. Keith clearly had been forced to give Spyder the production credit and he was not happy about it. As a result, he did even less than he had on
Crimes of Passion
. On that record he at least had a façade of involvement. This time he was much more blatant about checking out. His attitude toward Spyder was basically, “You want to co-produce? Have fun, I'm outta here.” In all honesty, we were glad. At least this time it was more up-front, and we knew how to react. Things ran much smoother in his absence.

The strange thing about recording this third album,
Precious Time,
was that I felt little of the pressure I'd experienced during the making
of
Crimes of Passion
. With
Crimes of Passion
, I felt like I had to do something to top
In the Heat of the Night
and “Heartbreaker.” Now, even with the strength of
Crimes of Passion,
I felt easier about the whole process. I had a lot of faith in the routine and collaboration we'd established on the first two albums, and now that Spyder's role in the process was clearly defined, things would move even more smoothly. Not to mention that the confidence that came from multiple successes was immeasurable. It wasn't that we were arrogant, but we finally trusted ourselves—no small thing in a business where instincts are usually the difference between a good record and a great one.

From day one, it was evident that Spyder appreciated going into the process on equal footing instead of simply being the lifesaver. As usual, he busted his ass in the studio. He was a perfectionist, sometimes recutting a song time and again before he was satisfied. The one time that Spyder's state of mind showed up on the album was on the reggae-flavored song “It's a Tuff Life.” Here's how he explained it: “I really didn't like the things that were going on in Southern California at the time. More of the same hollow excess that seemed to permeate every aspect of the record business. Reggae seemed to fit the lyric—
You thought you'd move to Jamaica, so you packed your bags and headed south to get an even tan
,
But you didn't count on the rain
.”

I wrote more melodies on this album. I was sometimes reluctant to go for the melody because Spyder was so good at it. However, with “Promises in the Dark,” I put together the whole melody with the exception of the bridge, though I was so new to songwriting that I wasn't at all confident about my skills. I was also embarrassed to write about anything personal; most of what I'd previously written was more observational. But this song was about our relationship. When I'd first written the lyrics, Spyder was working in the music room in our house, and I was so nervous to share them that I literally slipped them under the door and walked away. When I came back he told me how much he liked what I'd done, and we immediately began constructing the song.
This became our writing process, with one of us beginning an idea and giving it to the other one, then stepping away so that the other could put all the ideas together to complete the song.

The end result was a record that was more contemplative, more reflective, than either of the first two. Some of the songs are very long—but it's been called a masterpiece of layered, explosive rock and roll. And while the label worried about the length of some songs, they primarily cared that they had a couple of strong radio songs. They found them in “Fire and Ice” and “Promises in the Dark.”

The recording, though, had taken its toll. By the time we'd finished the record, we were ready to move from the house in Tarzana, but both of us were unhappy—not as much with each other as with the situation. For such a long time, I would have laughed at the idea of anything coming between Spyder and me. Then one day, in the middle of our tour, Spyder sat me down and when he started talking, his words froze me.

“I love you so much, and I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with you. I thought we were going to make a family together.” He paused just long enough for me to fear the words that would follow. “But you know what? It's just too hard. It's killing me.”

“What are you saying?” I asked.

“I don't know what I'm going to do. But I can't do this anymore.”

I tried to talk to him, but he was adamant. He was getting killed emotionally. He said that he wasn't coming with me when I moved, that we'd still stay close and we'd keep the band together. But he just had to separate himself from the relationship.

I couldn't believe that this was actually happening, and I had no idea how it had gotten to that point. I felt I had no choice but to go ahead and move. I bought a house in a gated community there in Tarzana, and in February of 1981 I moved in alone. I knew that we were meant to be together, but the situation had driven a wedge between us—a wedge that it didn't seem we could move past.

In a little over six months I'd hit just about every high and low imaginable. The euphoria of having a bestselling record was now tainted by my crumbling relationship. I was devastated—pushed to the brink of a nervous breakdown. This was the man I planned to spend the rest of my life with, to have my children with. We had it all planned. Now there was no plan. Except that we would make this band work.

When we were in Los Angeles, Spyder came over every night for dinner. We talked about music, about what the album was doing. We talked about upcoming shows. We made small talk. But there was no outward display of emotion. It was like we were back to the beginning again, with every moment spent close to him my own private agony. The worst part was that instead of feeling like we were moving toward something, we were moving farther away, and I was unable to set things right. He was the person I knew I was supposed to be with. There was no doubt in my mind that without the drama of the music and the label, we would have been together. If we were both just punching clocks somewhere in the Midwest, everything would have been fine, but we weren't. As a result we couldn't be together, and we had no physical relationship. Neither of us wanted to be with anyone else, but we just couldn't be with each other.

Sitting alone at my kitchen table in Tarzana, I had no illusions about what had gone on here. They'd won this round. There had been many slights and signs of disrespect since I'd had that showcase three years earlier and signed on the dotted line, but I felt this one more acutely than anything that had come before. They'd hoped for a breakup all along, and now they finally had it.

 

P
RECIOUS
T
IME
WAS SET
to release in late July 1981, right before we debuted on a new television concept, a game changer in the music
industry. The first I heard about it was when Chrysalis approached us about shooting a live performance to be aired on a television channel that was to launch in August. It was called MTV.

“It's cutting-edge,” they said. “You'll be one of the first bands on the air.”

Be a guinea pig? Sure. I loved the idea.

It would be a performance video of the Rascals song we'd covered, called “You Better Run.” It had been a hit when I was in junior high, and when I moved to New York, my friend Cynthia Zimmer, who had an extensive record collection, pulled it out one day when I was looking for cover songs to sing at Catch. I ended up working the song into my live show when I was trying to land a record deal. “You Better Run” was one of the tracks on
Crimes of Passion,
even though we'd recorded it previously for the soundtrack to the movie
Roadie
. Keith Olsen had actually produced “You Better Run” as his trial run for the fiasco that would become the
Crimes of Passion
sessions. Because everything had gone smoothly during that recording we'd agreed to have him on
Crimes of Passion
.