Pat Benatar played it like a runty neighborhood punk right out of the box. To paraphrase a memorable passage from one of her early interviews: most chick singers tell their men, "If you hurt me, I'll die." Pat Benatar says, "If you hurt me, I'll kick your ass."

In the Heat of the Night sounded like a test-tube baby with an AOR radio programmer and a record-company exec for parents. Some of it lumbered and crunched, much of it snarled and grandstanded, and there was a dash of Mike Chapman production doodling added for certified neo-Blondie modernism. The LP was a monster hit, and John Q. Public instantly elected Benatar rock woman of the year.

The unarguable mediocrity of the music itself wasn't anything to get wound up about–it could hardly dull the collective unconsciousness any more than the tons of crap in its ancestry. The Benatar persona was the scary part. Ostensibly, the decade-plus of feminist activism prior to In the Heat of the Night had put some distance between women and helplessness, between men and machismo. Linda Ronstadt may have played the passive cutie at times during her rise in the early Seventies, but a modicum of compassionate intelligence and assertiveness lurked somewhere beneath the surface. Donna Summer ruled the last half of the decade as a pleasure queen yet handled that shtick with humor and benevolence. Then Benatar came on with the most heinous behavior of both sexes. Her tiny frame squeezed into Spandex and spike heels, her cupie-doll petulance, suggested a Scarlett O'Hara understudy. And in celebration of male stupidity, at least half the songs on the album were anthems of pugnacious vindication. Here was a pop heroine of the Eighties, supposedly – and, jeezus, she'd missed the point. While millions of kids were hanging on her every move.

Crimes of Passion was a little less of a horror story. (Except for the publicity stills, of course. Benatar languishing in leotards or tights and looking sultry was just more of the old garbage.) Mike Chapman and his production crew were gone, as was a lot of the bombast and melodrama in the tunes and the way they were delivered. There were fewer paeans to romantic revenge, not as much manipulative insolence. Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights" was a glimmer from an unguarded heart, and Benatar, a classically trained soprano, offered an interpretation as affecting as the beautiful sound of her voice.

Precious Time takes the improvements in Crimes of Passion a tiny step further. Power pop tempers some of the power chording ("Hard to Believe," "Precious Time," "Take It Anyway You Want It"). The rock kicks ("Helter Skelter" especially) without any anatomical targets, while the helpless martyr puts in a brief appearance only during "Hard to Believe." In "Promises in the Dark," Pat Benatar and guitarist-coproducer Neil Geraldo provide an accurate, tender and grown-up account of a victim with every reason to feel victimized, but with the instincts and insight to resist doing so. Benatar and Geraldo also penned the record's two biggest clinkers. Like last year's "Little Paradise," "It's a Tuff Life" finds Geraldo taking petty swipes at Los Angeles high life. Both writers should be embarrassed by "Evil Genius," a dismally told tale about a smart kid who kills people. Reminiscent of "Hell Is for Children," "Evil Genius" is a strong indication that cogent social commentary is beyond Benatar's reach.

Obviously, what is within Benatar's reach isn't much. But it's not totally insignificant that Precious Time hints at some sort of capacity for humanism. And as long as all those kids buy into whatever Pat Benatar says (whether she means to say it or not), even the slightest touch of compassion isn't insignificant at all. (RS 355)

LAURA FISSINGER