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The
first of many acts to cement the college town of Athens,
GA, as a hotbed of alternative music, the B-52's took
their name from the Southern slang for the mile-high
bouffant wigs sported by singers Kate Pierson and Cindy
Wilson, a look emblematic of the band's campy, thrift-store
aesthetic. The five-piece group, which also included
founding members Fred Schneider, guitarist Ricky Wilson
(Cindy's older brother), and drummer Keith Strickland,
formed in the mid-'70s after a drunken evening at a
Chinese restaurant; the bandmembers had little or no
previous musical experience, and performed most of their
earliest shows with taped guitar and percussion accompaniment.
After pressing up a few thousand copies of the single
"Rock Lobster," the B-52's traveled to the
famed Max's Kansas City club for their first paying
gig. Subsequent appearances at CBGB's brought the group
to the attention of the New York press, and in 1979,
they issued their self-titled debut album, a collection
of manic, bizarre, and eminently danceable songs which
scored an underground club hit with a reworked version
of "Rock Lobster." The following year, they
issued Wild Planet, which reached the Top 20 on the
U.S. album charts; Party Mix!, an EP's worth of reworked
material from the band's first two proper outings, appeared
in 1981.
1982's Mesopotamia arose out of a series of aborted
sessions with producer David Byrne which saw the B-52's
largely abandon their trademark sense of humor, a situation
rectified by the next year's Whammy!, a move into electronic
territory. After a Schneider solo LP, 1984's Fred Schneider
& the Shake Society, the group returned to the studio
to record 1986's Bouncing Off the Satellites. On October
12, 1985, however, Ricky Wilson died; though originally
his death was attributed to natural causes, it was later
revealed that he had succumbed to AIDS. In light of
Wilson's death, the group found it impossible to promote
the new album, and they spent the next several years
in seclusion.
In 1989, the B-52's finally returned with Cosmic Thing,
their most commercially successful effort to date. Marked
by Strickland's move from drums to guitar and club-friendly
production from Don Was and Nile Rodgers, the album
launched several hit singles, including the party smash
"Love Shack," "Roam," and "Deadbeat
Club." In 1990, Cindy Wilson retired from active
duty, leaving the remaining trio to soldier on for 1992's
Good Stuff. A year later, dubbed the BC-52's, they performed
the theme song for Steven Spielberg's live-action feature
The Flintsones. Wilson returned to the group for a tour
supporting the release of 1998's hits collection Time
Capsule. |
