Thanks to the B-52s, the pop music industry today can point to one of its favorite acts and justifiably invoke one of its most overworked cliches: No one is more surprised by the group`s high-flying comeback than the band members themselves.
”It was very unexpected, but it has been very exciting,” said guitarist Keith Strickland, so unassuming that he actually struggles for words to describe the band`s reaction to the multiplatinum success of its album
”Cosmic Thing.”
”We didn`t think in terms of having a hit,” Strickland said. Neither did Reprise Records, according to Steven Baker, Los Angeles vice president and product manager for the band`s label.
”Their last two albums were quite successful, but sales of this LP are almost 2.3 million,” he said. ”Amazing.”
Even more astonishing to Baker are the reactions of Strickland and bandmates Kate Pierson, Cindy Wilson and Fred Schneider.
”I think they`re shocked,” Baker said. ”But when this album started doing well, I can`t tell you how many people-no matter where they were in the industry-said how great they felt about the success of the B-52s.”
Much of that sentiment has been inspired by the band`s refusal to collapse after the 1986 death of guitarist Ricky Wilson.
But the B-52s-formed in Athens, Ga., in 1977 and residents of metropolitan New York since the early 1980s-did need three years to create
”Cosmic Thing,” still on Billboard`s pop chart after peaking at No. 3 in March.
”We wanted to get back to the live-band sound,” said Strickland. ”We really felt a need to recapture that aspect of the group. We had experimented with electronics and stuff, but we didn`t want that to overshadow the performance of the group.”
The B-52s had another goal-an activist one that seems incongruous for a band best-known for the songs ”Rock Lobster” and ”Love Shack,” beehive hairdos and funky clothes.
”We are a party band and we are about having fun, but without clean air, clean water and the basic necessities, the party will be over,” Strickland said. ”That`s something we`ve touched on in the past, but we wanted to really communicate that idea in the song `Channel Z.”`
That element is one of several Baker cites in trying to explain the response to ”Cosmic Thing,” which has benefited from high-rotation airing of its videos on MTV. However, the media have paid little attention to the band`s plea for change in ”Channel Z.”
The goofy, party-hearty image does make for reader-catching headlines. Some recent samples: ”At Home in the Top 40 and Still Full of Kitsch” (The New York Times), ”The Return of American`s Favorite Party Band” (Rolling Stone), ”They`re fun, they`re back and they don`t hate white people” (Spin). But can the B-52s maintain the band`s high altitude? ”There`s no reason they can`t,” Baker said. ”Cosmic Thing” benefits from the beat-happy production of Nile Rodgers and Don Was. But, Baker continued, the band ”wrote the songs, arranged them and made the record. You`ve got to give them all the credit, so it`s really up to them.”
All Strickland dares to predict is that there will be a next album.
”I`ve been listening to some jams we did before this last album and to some things that didn`t get worked into this album, and some good ideas are still there,” he said.
Before returning to writing and recording, the band, touring with three backup musicians, will conclude its American tour with a fall AIDS benefit in Los Angeles and then tour Australia and New Zealand. ”Then we`ll take a little time off, get settled back home, get our feet back on the ground and start writing,” Strickland said.
He laughed when asked how long it will take the four musicians to come up with an album`s worth of material. ”We approach writing very delicately,” he explained, ”and the fact we all write keeps the band strong, but it also makes us slower.”
Reprise Records won`t hurry the band, though Baker says the label is about ready to allow ”Cosmic Thing” to fall from orbit. The latest single,
”Deadbeat Club,” stopped at No. 30 on the Billboard pop list after
”Cosmic Thing” and ”Roman” both reached No. 3.
”At this point,” Baker said, ”I think we`ll just kind of let `Cosmic Thing` go. . . . It`s time to let the band finish their tour and think about what they`re going to do in the future.”
