Chrissie Hynde

Christine Ellen Hynde (born September 7, 1951) is an American-British musician.

She is a founding member and the lead vocalist, guitarist, and primary songwriter of the rock band The Pretenders, and one of the band's two remaining original members alongside drummer Martin Chambers.

She is the only continuous member of the band, appearing on every studio album.

Hynde was also caught up in the Kent State massacre on May 4, 1970, in which the boyfriend of one of her friends was among the four victims.

In May 1973, Hynde moved to London.

With her art background, she landed a job in an architectural firm but left after eight months.

It was then that she met rock journalist Nick Kent and landed a position at the music magazine New Musical Express (NME), writing what she subsequently described as "half-baked philosophical drivel and nonsensical tirades."

This proved not to last and Hynde later got a job at Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood's clothing store, Sex.

Hynde attempted to start a band in France, The Frenchies (fr), before her return to Cleveland in 1975, and joined a rhythm and blues group, Jack Rabbit.

She returned to France in 1976 to try to form a band but it did not materialize.

She left Kent for Michael Fradji Memmi, bass player of the Frenchies, which she joined.

For one show at the Olympia Theatre when their singer had left, she performed as lead singer.

She returned to London in the midst of the early punk movement.

At one point she tried to convince Steve Jones and then Johnny Rotten (of the Sex Pistols, who were managed by McLaren) to marry her to get her a work permit.

Hynde's version of this episode has it that Rotten "offered to go to a registry office with me and do the unmentionable" but when he subsequently withdrew, Sid Vicious volunteered to take his place.

Upon arrival at the registry office the following morning, they found it "closed for an extended holiday" and were unable to attend the following day due to Vicious making a court appearance.

In late 1976, Hynde responded to an advertisement in Melody Maker for band members and attended an audition for the band that would become 999.

Jon Moss (who would later be in Culture Club) and Tony James of Generation X also auditioned.

Later, Hynde tried to start a group with Mick Jones from the Clash.

After the lack of success with the band, Malcolm McLaren placed her as a guitarist in Masters of the Backside but she was asked to leave the group just as it became The Damned.

After a brief spell in the band Johnny Moped, Mick Jones invited Hynde to join his band on their initial tour of Britain.

Hynde recollected of that period,

It was great, but my heart was breaking.

I wanted to be in a band so bad.

And to go to all the gigs, to see it so close up, to be living in it and not to have a band was devastating to me.

When I left, I said, "Thanks a lot for lettin' me come along," and I went back and went weeping on the Underground throughout London.

All the people I knew in town, they were all in bands.

And there I was, like the real loser, you know?

Really the loser.

Hynde formed the Pretenders in Hereford, England in 1978, with Pete Farndon, James Honeyman-Scott and Chambers.

She has also recorded a number of songs with other musicians including Frank Sinatra, Cher and UB40.

Hynde also spent a short time with punk band the Moors Murderers in 1978.

Hynde was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005 as a member of the Pretenders.

Hynde was born in Akron, Ohio, the daughter of a part-time secretary and a Yellow Pages manager.

She graduated from Firestone High School in Akron but stated that "I was never too interested in high school. I mean, I never went to a dance, I never went out on a date, I never went steady. It became pretty awful for me. Except, of course, I could go see bands, and that was the kick. I used to go to Cleveland just to see any band. So I was in love a lot of the time, but mostly with guys in bands that I had never met. For me, knowing that Brian Jones was out there, and later that Iggy Pop was out there, made it kind of hard for me to get too interested in the guys that were around me. I had, uh, bigger things in mind."

Hynde became interested in hippie counterculture, Eastern mysticism, and vegetarianism.

While attending Kent State University's Art School for three years, she joined Sat.

Sun.

Mat., a band which included Mark Mothersbaugh, later of Devo.

She recorded her first solo album, Stockholm, in 2014.