Pat Benatar emerged at the dawn of the 1980s with a sound that mixed the soaring power chords of arena rock with a combination of tough grit and mainstream pop sense. Songs like 1979’s “Heartbreaker” and “Hit Me with Your Best Shot,” from her acclaimed sophomore album Crimes of Passion, made her an international star ahead of 1981’s chart-topping Precious Time. During the front half of the decade, Benatar became an icon of the early MTV era, earning four Grammy Awards and stringing together a series of gritty pop anthems like “Love Is a Battlefield” and “We Belong,” major hits that remain motivational classics and staples of classic rock radio. After 1985’s “Invincible,” her popularity began to falter somewhat and her output subsequently fell off during the ’90s. After 2003’s Go, Benatar entered a recording hiatus that was eventually broken by a handful of stand-alone singles at the end of the 2010s. She also published a memoir, Between a Heart and a Rock Place.
A native New Yorker, Patricia Andrzejewski was born in Greenpoint, Brooklyn on January 10, 1953 and raised in the nearby town of Lindenhurst on Long Island. She began her career as a lounge singer in Richmond, Virginia where she and her first husband, Dennis Benatar, a member of the U.S. Army, were stationed. While singing as part of a lounge band called Coxon’s Army, Benatar released a regionally distributed independent single, 1974’s “Day Gig,” before relocating to New York City. During the latter half of the ’70s, she built up her profile through regular nightclub appearances at the famed comedy club Catch a Rising Star while recording jingles on the side. By 1978, she’d attracted both management and label attention and soon signed a deal with Chrysalis Records. Around this same time, she and Dennis divorced, though she would continue to use his surname for the remainder of her career.
A stellar band formed around Benatar led by guitarist Neil Giraldo, a musician who became her primary collaborator and eventually her husband. She scored a hit right out of the gate with her 1979 debut In the Heat of the Night, which yielded two popular radio singles “Heartbreaker” and “I Need a Lover” (the latter of which was written by a then-unknown John Mellencamp). Benatar’s mix of fiery rock songs and pop balladry presented a winning mix and her sophomore effort, 1980’s Crimes of Passion, more than delivered on the debut’s promise. A critical and commercial success, the album went multi-platinum behind hits like “Treat Me Right, “You Better Run,” and her signature song, “Hit Me with Your Best Shot.” A Grammy Award (the first of four) for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance further bolstered her rising star status ahead of 1981’s Precious Time, her first U.S. chart-topper, and its lead single “Fire and Ice.”