Album Review: The B-52's

The B-52's - The B-52's (1979)

Coming from the post-punk sci-fi kitsch party bin, it's The B-52's eponymous debut. It's a collection of catchy weirdness with sparse beats, angular guitars, space-keyboards, and a weird paranoid / campy lead singer whose odd vocals are perfectly matched by the caterwauling backup singers. This is way more stripped down than the "Love Shack" single for which they're wedding-famous, but it's every bit as infectious and dance-worthy. The opening track is a stellar, invigorating Peter Gunn riff-off that invokes black and white B-movie credits. It definitely sets a mood of the other-worldly, and the rest of the album follows through aptly. Spy-show themes, surf guitars, and oh those vocals, all instantiated in overwhelmingly memorable hooks and toe-tap inspiration.

This album is routinely listed amongst the top alternative albums "of all time," and this is largely due to the neat pulled-trick of mixing general pop-sensibility with enough of the off-kilter to make it gripping. I.e., it hits a great middle of being groundedly out there, so you can feel simultaneously cool for embracing your inner weirdo and dancing along with the masses to a backbeat. It's another one where if you find the vocal tics annoying you may not be able to handle it, but I for one dig it - you're probably familiar with the timbre of "you see a faded sign at the side of the road," but trust that it's even more idiosyncratic on this disc. It's also mired in some weird associations for me - I can't hear it without getting a nice Patti Smith / Sleater Kinney blend in my mind. "Hero Worship" in particular makes me find the entire Sleater Kinney oeuvre to be somewhat lifted, though that band obviously has a lot more severity and edge to their message/music.

Side A of the disc is absolutely bang up; the opener "Planet Claire" is excellent, and "52 Girls" and "Dance This Mess Around" establish all of the aforementioned dance-sensibilities with flair. Next comes "Rock Lobster," probably the "real" B-52's signature tune, and it's just seven kinds of wacko greatness (think spies, beaches, and, um, lobsters). Side B is very solid but a clear drop-off; the aforementioned "Hero Worship" is the definite highlight of the back half, but unfortunately this otherwise great disc closes with a bit of a throwaway in "Downtown." All told, of course, this is a seminal album that crosses a ton of genres, simultaneously embodying that late '70s CBGB vibe and a retro call to all things beehive. Seminal, great, if not necessarily desert-island-worthy.

Status: Recommended
Nyet's Fave: "Planet Claire"