Coachella 2023: Blondie rocks out to '70s, '80s hits; welcomes guest Nile Rodgers

Blondie blasted the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival crowd to the past with pop rock hits from the 1970s and 1980s during its Friday night performance in the Mojave tent.

Kicking things off with 1979 hit "One Way Or Another," audience members young and old — or at least those who have the largest text option on their phone — sang, danced and clapped along as they welcomed frontwoman Debbie Harry to the desert. Harry, wearing futuristic-looking black sunglasses, leather vest jacket and acid-washed pants, looked and sounded like a true rocker. Even the weather was on her side: the wind picking up in the Mojave tent perfectly blew her hair back.

The legendary singer also shouted out the people she'd seen at the festival throughout the day.

"I've seen a lot of good looking people here today ... and sexy," she said during her set. But she did seem concerned about how chilly some might be. "You're walking around here with no clothes on. ... I feel so overdressed."

Blondie, co-founded by Harry and guitarist Chris Stein, formed in the mid-1970s and is well-known for rock hits "One Way or Another," "Heart of Glass," "Call Me," "Atomic" and "The Tide Is High." Throughout the set, Harry and her bandmates played hit after hit, and even added a few flourishes to some. "The Tide Is High," a rocksteady song, included a couple of heavy metal touches to it, before going back to its Jamaican-sounding beat.

Blondie later welcomed special guest Nile Rodgers to jam out on the guitar for songs "Rapture" and "Backfired." The co-founder of Chic admitted that he was going to "improvise" on the guitar "since we already messed up the ending" of "Backfired," but the full-tent crowd didn't mind either way, as people kept dancing and singing along.

Before Rodgers left the stage, greeted by thunderous applause, he said, "This is what happens when old friends say they want to play together."

Blondie also played a few newer songs during the set, including "Long Time" from 2017. The group disbanded in 1982, but reformed in 1997. Its 11th studio album, "Pollinator," was released in 2017.

No matter how much time has passed since audience members last saw or listened to the group, they couldn't get enough of Harry's interactions with the crowd. When she took off her black sunglasses, the Mojave tent erupted into applause. Someone also threw a pair of long underwear on the stage at one point, and Harry said she was "going to need to write a song about underwear" at some point.

The group ended their set with "Heart of Glass" — for which Harry put on a shimmering hooded poncho and said the crowd's singing was "beautiful" — and "Dreaming." Both seemed to put the crowd into a good mood as they embarked on more nighttime Coachella adventures.

Ema Sasic covers entertainment and health in the Coachella Valley. Reach her at ema.sasic@desertsun.com or on Twitter @ema_sasic.

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Coachella 2023: Blondie brings '70s, '80s to the Mojave tent