Patty Donahue

American singer (1956–1996)

Patricia Jean Donahue (March 29, 1956 – December 9, 1996), known as Patty Donahue, was the lead singer of the 1980s new wave group The Waitresses. She is best known for the band’s singles "I Know What Boys Like" and "Christmas Wrapping".

Patricia Jean Donahue was born on March 29, 1956, in Akron, Ohio. Her parents divorced when she was two years old. She told an interviewer that her mother raised her to be an independent woman. Like her mother and sister, Donahue attended St. Joseph Academy in Cleveland. In her early 20s, before joining The Waitresses, she worked as a waitress. Donahue was among the performers who developed a new standard for women in rock music during the new wave era. Although Butler was the leader and songwriter of the Waitresses, fans and music journalists often singled out Donahue as the band's primary asset. Butler wrote the lyrics but, as Rolling Stone asserted, "Donahue is no pop band puppet". During the recording of the second and final Waitresses' album Bruiseology, Donahue left the band and was replaced temporarily by Holly Beth Vincent before Donahue rejoined soon afterward. Donahue was sought personally by Alice Cooper to duet with him on the single "I Like Girls". Cooper exuberantly told an interviewer: "I'd be driving in the car and every time I'd want to turn up the radio, it was Patty Donahue." "I Like Girls" appears on Cooper's album Zipper Catches Skin with Donahue credited for "vocals and sarcasm". Soon Donahue stepped away from performance altogether. She took work as a talent scout for MCA Publishing, and later became an A&R rep for MCA Records.

On December 9, 1996, Donahue, who had been a heavy smoker most of her adult life, died of lung cancer in New York at the age of 40. She was interred in the Holy Cross Cemetery in Brook Park, a suburb of Cleveland.