Sex Pistols bassist and singer-songwriter Glen Matlock is to appear on Blondie’s upcoming studio album. The musicians stepped in to tour with the band earlier this year after Leigh Foxx suffered a back injury. As Foxx – who has been a member of the band since 1997 – continues to recuperate, Matlock has taken over bass duties in the studio too.
Unlike the band’s last album, 2017’s Pollinator, which saw Blondie collaborating with artists including Sia, Charli XCX, Dave Sitek and Johnny Marr, Matlock will seemingly be the only guest this time around. No release date or album title has yet been announced for the new record.
Guitarist Chris Stein tells Classic Pop: “Glen has just been great. Unlike Pollinator, we’re mostly keeping this album in-house: it’s just the band and Glen playing on it. He’s fitted right in”.
As well as Foxx, Stein also sat out the band’s tour dates earlier this year, due to heart issues. He was replaced on stage by KMFDM’s Andee Blacksugar, but has seemingly been well enough to play in the studio.
Meanwhile, the first authorized, in-depth boxed set anthology by Blondie was released via UMC and the Numero Group on August 26.
Blondie: Against The Odds 1974-1982 has been remastered from the original analog tapes and cut at Abbey Road Studios. It’s available on in a Super Deluxe Collector’s Edition as well as Deluxe 4LP, Deluxe 8CD and 3CD configurations.
The boxed set will be housed in a foil-wrapped carton, and will contain extensive liner notes by Erin Osmon; a track-by-track commentary by Debbie Harry, Chris Stein, Clem Burke, Jimmy Destri, Nigel Harrison, Frank Infante, and Gary Valentine; essays by producers Mike Chapman, Richard Gottehrer, and Ken Shipley; a 120-page illustrated discography; and hundreds of period photographs.
Against The Odds 1974-1982 is the first such collection to be authorized by the band in their 50-year history. It includes, in their entirety, Blondie’s first six studio albums for Chrysalis – Blondie, Plastic Letters, Parallel Lines, Eat To The Beat, Autoamerican, and The Hunter, and the huge hits that helped define a pop era, such as “Heart Of Glass,” “Atomic,” “The Tide Is High,” “Sunday Girl,” “Rapture,” and “Call Me.”
The albums have been expanded to include more than four dozen demos, including those that formed the group’s first-ever recording session, as well as alternate versions and studio outtakes. The result is a near-complete document of Blondie’s entire history of studio sessions before their hiatus in 1982.
