Beauty and the Beat

Forget about the Australian outback and Jeff Probst: Belinda Carlisle is the original survivor. "I keep bouncing back from things." she says. "After the drugs and the ebb and tide of success in my life. I've had nine lives already." This cool cat's story, and one of the defining grrl-power moments, began more than 20 years ago in Los Angeles when Belinda and pal Jane Wiedlin formed an all-girl band called the Go-Go's. Inspired by the do-it-yourself attitude of Blondie and the Sex Pistols, the Go-Go's debuted i n 1978 at a Hollywood punk club. In those days Belinda sported a green do and dressed in garbage bags, belting out raw versions of future hits. Their first album. Beauty and the Beat, fueled by the early Eighties anthems We Got the Beat and Our Lips Are Sealed, is a classic of the all-female rock canon. Two more albums with hit singles. Vacation and Head Over Heels, followed, but squabbles over royalties and various substance-abuse problems drove the girls apart in 1985. "I think women have a harder time getting along in a group than men do." Belinda says. "Maybe that's a sexist thing to say, but emotions can run more intensely with a group of girls."

Belinda enjoyed success as a solo artist, releasing six albums that included hits like Mad About You. Heaven Is a Place on Earth and Circle in the Sand. But the shots she took from the media for her weight fluctuations took their toll over the years and, ultimately, inspired the 42-year-old to pose for playboy. "It wasn't until the Go-Go's that my name was synonymous with plump, cute and chubby," she says. "One of the things I thought was appealing about the Go-Go's was that we weren't models--we were normal girls doing it on our own terms, and women loved that. Critics would say things like, 'Oh, she's been hitting too many deli trays,' or 'I wonder what drug she is doing to get thin." I still find the whole thing completely offensive and believe this fed into my drug addiction. It wasn't until I moved to Europe and had my baby that this weight obsession left." Belinda lives in the south of France with her nine-year-old son. Duke, and her husband. Morgan Mason. "I was born and raised in California, but I don't want to grow old or raise my child there," she says. "The 1994 Northridge quake happened on Monday and we left that Friday." Earth shakes notwithstanding, Belinda says that she craves adventure, which currently includes getting her French residency, perfecting her French and completing her next solo album.

Although the Go-Go's reunited three times in the Nineties for tours, the girls didn't release a new album until this year's God Bless the Go-Go's. It features the single Unforgiven, a poignant autobiographical ballad called Daisy Chain and an anthem for full-figured women called Throw Me a Curve. The new disc is their most compelling work since Beauty and the Beat. Inspired by a slew of young fans catching New Wave's second tide, the Go-Go's will tour all summer. "I think we all look at it as closure," Belinda says. "'We have separate lives and other interests, so it is more difficult for us to get together. We feel like we made a really good record, so everything else is gravy." The singer has come to terms with being labeled alternative with the Go-Go's. "I've been a Top 40 artist a long time and all of a sudden I'm something else, so I am sort of confused as to what I am. But that's fine--I like being confused. Go to a Go-Go's show and you'll see people in their 50s, people with Mohawks and eight-year-olds--a wide range. It goes way beyond any specific demographic."

Belinda says she has only one regret--an old homemade movie filmed backstage that now pops up online. "There is no sex in it at all--just a bunch of stupid coke ramblings, and it is boring," she says. "I regret that evening because a lot of people were hurt by that video. But I don't regret anything else in my life because even the negative things, as hideous as they were, were really important to go through. They made me what I am today, and I'm totally happy and comfortable with myself."