Blondie still weaving tangled roots into art

CALL Blondie the original mash-up band.

By cross-pollinating reggae, new wave and hip-hop with a uniquely downtown New York art-punk aesthetic, the group was a major force in rock’s evolution in the ‘70s and ‘80s -- hence its induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame next month.

As a fitting coda to that mix-and-match success, their new career overview “Blondie: Greatest Hits -- Sound and Vision” (which hits shelves March 7) includes “Rapture Riders,” one of the best mash-ups ever produced.

Put together by Mark Vidler under his professional name, Go Home Productions, it grafts Blondie’s 1981 hip-hop homage “Rapture” onto the Doors’ spookily existential FM radio mainstay “Riders on the Storm.”

“Everyone in the band had all these influences that got tossed together,” says Blondie’s guitarist, Chris Stein.

Adds singer Deborah Harry, “We definitely were influenced by a lot of different styles and tried to include them in what we were doing. It wasn’t exactly a mash-up, but it certainly has the same energy.”

As it turns out, the Doors’ keyboardist Ray Manzarek was one of the band’s early adopters. He introduced himself to Blondie in Los Angeles during their debut 1976 tour.

“Ray was one of the first people we met starting out,” Harry says. “So to have this comeback at the tail end of our career is a nice thing. It gives an incredible sense of completion.”

Not so, however, their inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

“We thought it was going to be pretty horrible,” the singer admits. “Blondie’s never really been about awards. And Chris and I didn’t think we even cared.”

“But then all our non-music friends told us it was kind of a big deal,” Stein says.

“Now we’ve decided it’s kind of nice,” Harry says, laughing. “It doesn’t suck.”

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Pete Doherty’s prison diaries

Earlier this month, Brit-rock bad boy Pete Doherty, 26, did a two-week stint in north London’s Pentonville Prison after being caught with crack cocaine and heroin -- the latest addition to a growing rap sheet that includes “offensive weapon” charges and a previous jail stay for burglary.

The singer for the band Babyshambles (and formerly the Libertines) and the ex of supermodel Kate Moss kept assiduous prison diaries chronicling his various reactions to chemical withdrawal, toothaches and idle time in Her Majesty’s remand -- quasi-poetic musings he shared with the liberal U.K. newspaper the Guardian.

In those writings, Doherty sounds, by turns, arrogant and sorry -- sorry mostly for himself:

Feb. 1: Court on the 8th and hoping for bail. Even life without drugs has gotta be betta than this malarkey. Babyshambles all set to take over as well. Won’t do this again guv.... Oh yes you will Doherty and you know it.... Get to grips with the idea that it is eating away at your money, your love and your life.

Feb. 3: Things that break up the day in fits and starts: food, medication, showers, a game of pool if you’re lucky, walking in circles around the yard. A legal visit, or any visit. I’m doing 10 [push-] ups at a time, not with great ease at the moment.... I’ll come out of here fitter and stronger than in a long time.... Can’t complain at all, really.

Feb. 5: I must become a hero, organize my life and obtain from it what they deny me. If I live, in order to continue to live with myself, I must have more talent than the exquisite poet. These people can only put up with the tamed heroes -- they don’t know about heroism.

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It’s Notting Hill, the musical

Following in the footsteps of Billy Joel and Elton John, who parlayed pop stardom into Broadway musical success, comes ... Damon Albarn? The prickly Blur frontman (and the brains behind the Grammy-nominated animated band

Gorillaz) is writing a stage musical based on life in London’s

uber-trendy Notting Hill, the BBC reports, to be performed at London’s National Theatre next year.

It’s being dubbed an “antidote” to the 1999 Julia Roberts rom-com “Notting Hill,” reflecting the neighborhood’s true multi-culti (and decidedly un-yuppie) nature.