Way Back Wednesday: Pat Benetar

Pat Benetar had such an impact on my musical journey.  When I was in middle school, my friend Sharla and I were OBSESSED with her.  We joined Columbia Record Club so that we could get all of her albums.  We spent our summer and all of our free time listening to them, logging the lyrics and wishing we were as cool as Pat.  Sharla's parents had mirrors hanging on the wall of their living room and we would clear enough space so that we could perform Pat Benetar songs in the mirror for hours on end.  Neither of us could come close to matching Pat's amazing vocal talent, so we would lip sync and pretend that we were on Solid Gold performing and dancing to her songs.  We even went so far as to do our own "episodes" of Solid Gold that we would record on cassette.  There is one very special Christmas episode that we recorded where my live rendition of "Carol of the Bells" ("Hark how the bells, sweet silver bells...") made ears bleed throughout the county (imagine an out-of-tune and baritone BUMMMM......BUMMMM.......BUMMMM).  Pat Benetar, I am not.  It's a good thing cassettes are dead!