Pat Benatar Won't Be Singing 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot' Anymore

Pat Benatar has revealed that she will no longer be performing 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot'.

The US rock singer has been performing the tune for decades, but she has decided to remove it from her setlist and has advised fans to listen to it at home.

Of course, whenever you see an iconic musician live, they're going to play some of their new tunes, but there's an understanding that they will play their hits in return.

However, the 69-year-old has decided to stop singing one of her best known songs with good reason.

Speaking to USA Today, she said: "We have what we call the 'holy 14' songs that if we don't play them, you'll give us (a hard time).

"And we're not doing 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot' and fans are having a heart attack and I'm like, I'm sorry, in deference to the victims of the families of these mass shootings, I'm not singing it.

"I tell them, if you want to hear the song, go home and listen to it. (The title) is tongue-in-cheek, but you have to draw the line.

"I can't say those words out loud with a smile on my face, I just can't. I'm not going to go on stage and soapbox – I go to my legislators – but that's my small contribution to protesting. I'm not going to sing it. Tough."

The US continues to be blighted by mass shootings, and earlier this month in Chicago seven people were killed and dozens more were injured at a 4 July parade.

It followed mass shootings in the past few months across the country, including in New York's Buffalo, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and in Uvalde, Texas.

Speaking in the wake of the mass shooting in Chicago, President Joe Biden said he and first lady Jill Biden were 'shocked by the senseless gun violence that has yet again brought grief to an American community on this Independence Day'.

Last month, Biden signed the widest-ranging gun violence bill passed by Congress in decades, a compromise that showed at once both progress on a long-intractable issue and the deep-seated partisan divide that persists.

The legislation will toughen background checks for the youngest gun buyers and encourages states to remove guns from people considered a threat.

"While this bill doesn't do everything I want, it does include actions I've long called for that are going to save lives," Biden said.

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Topics: Music, Celebrity, US News, Politics

Jake Massey

Jake Massey is a journalist at LADbible. He graduated from Newcastle University, where he learnt a bit about media and a lot about living without heating. After spending a few years in Australia and New Zealand, Jake secured a role at an obscure radio station in Norwich, inadvertently becoming a real-life Alan Partridge in the process. From there, Jake became a reporter at the Eastern Daily Press. Jake enjoys playing football, listening to music and writing about himself in the third person.

@jakesmassey