That rock ‘n’ roll and abrasive behavior often go hand in hand is fairly common knowledge, and even if it wasn’t, a particularly risqué encounter between David Bowie and Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry is undoubtedly proof enough. The “Call Me” singer recounted the experience in Face It, and the details would make any pearl-clutching individual gasp with shock.
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But back then? “I was a consenting adult, shall we say,” Harry casually explained in a 2023 interview with The Times. She added, “Most women would really die to be in that room.”
Debbie Harry and David Bowie’s Risqué Encounter
In the late 1970s, rock ‘n’ roll and drugs were as synonymous as, say, punk music and combat boots or disco music and sequins. For Debbie Harry, frontwoman of Blondie, she was at the epicenter of all three musical movements. The iconic group dabbled in punk, rock, disco, and pop with tremendous success, even if the genre-bending took a while for listeners (and bandmates) to get used to. And, of course, there were drugs. Lots of them. In 1977, some of those drugs included a gram of c****** that Harry didn’t really want.
So, when she heard that David Bowie and Iggy Pop were looking for a connection while in New York City, she opted to play the role of friendly neighbor and, well, lend them some sugar. “I didn’t care for c*** too much,” she explained in her memoir, Face It (via Consequence of Sound). “It made me jittery and wired, and it affected my throat. I went upstairs with my vast quantity of c******, and they just sucked it right up in one swoop.”
Before Harry knew it, Bowie was exposing himself on the couch. “As if I were the official c*** checker or something,” she wrote in her autobiography. “Since I was in an all-male band, maybe they figured I really was the c***-check lady. David’s size was notorious, and he loved to pull it out with both men and women. It was so funny, adorable, and sexy.” Not necessarily the adjectives society might use well into the 2020s, but as Harry told The Times, she was a “consenting adult. I believe that that is really the borderline.”
Hung Up On Well-Hung Semantics, So To Speak
Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry’s risqué story about delivering a gram of c****** to David Bowie and Iggy Pop (and Bowie’s version of a “thank you”) is just one of countless rock ‘n’ roll stories that aren’t for the faint of heart. To be fair to Harry—and Bowie, we suppose—it’s hardly the worst tale to come from New York City in the 1970s and ‘80s. In fact, it’s not even the worst thing that Harry experienced while living in the city. And as she explained in 2023, she didn’t feel like Bowie was threatening or trying to scare her.
She reacted the way one might expect Harry to react: cool, calm, and a little bit punk. In a July 2025 interview with Vanity Fair, the salacious story unsurprisingly made its way into conversation. Harry confirmed that after Bowie exposed himself, he asked her, “Can I f*** you?” Harry replied, “I don’t know, can you?” Speaking to the magazine, she said, “I was such a smarta**. I regretted saying that, because he was such a wonderful artist and a wonderful person. I was just being punk; I worked very hard at being punk.”
After all, Harry added, “He’s British. [I thought] British people have more control and knowledge of proper English.” In this case, the most irritating aspect of the encounter was his using the question “can I” instead of “may I.” But what’s semantics in the world of rock ‘n’ roll, anyway?
Photo by IAN HODGSON/AFP via Getty Images
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