The B-52's Biography
Formed on an October night in 1976 following drinks at an Athens, Georgia USA, Chinese restaurant, this New Wave Pop-Rock band originally comprised singers Fred Schneider and Cindy Wilson, vocalist+organist Kate Pierson, drummer Keith Strickland and Cindy's older brother, Ricky Wilson on guitar.
The quintet issued the first single, "Rock Lobster", in 1979
beginning to attract fans in dance-clubs of the lower East Side and subsequently
The B-52's released its brillant self-titled debut album which broke into
the top 60 of the U.S. Pop chart.
Their second effort, "Wild Planet", came out in 1980 reaching
the #18 position on the Top 200 LPs & Tapes chart highlighted by the
worldwide hit single "Private Idaho" and "Give Me Back
My Man".
A 6-track EP "Party Mix" and "Mesopotamia" followed
in the next two years; both records made a dent in the U.S. Pop Albums
chart reaching #55 and #35, respectively.
"Whammy!" appeared in 1983 and took the quintet back into the
U.S. top 30.
Two years later, after the sessions of "Bouncing Off The Satellites",
they suffered their greatest tragedy, the death of Ricky Wilson from AIDS.
The album failed to rise above #85 on The Billboard Top 200 list and produced
two Hot Dance Club top 10 hits with "Summer Of Love" and "
Girl From Ipanema Goes To Greenland".
The B-52's returned in 1989 with their most commercially successful album
to date, "Cosmic Thing", it peaked at #4 on The Billboard Top
200 chart spawning "Love Shack" and "Roam", both hit
#3 on The Billboard Hot 100 and climbed The Modern Rock Tracks chart reaching
the #1 and #6 spots, respectively; "Channel Z" topped the Billboard's
Modern Rock chart, the title-track hit #7 on the same chart and "Deadbeat
Club" became the album's third Top 40 hit.
Cindy Wilson left the band in 1990 and Kate Pierson collaborated with
Athens compatriots R.E.M. singing with Michael
Stipe "Shiny Happy People". Subsequently, she duetted with Iggy
Pop on "Candy".
Pierson, Schneider and Strickland decided to record as a three-piece a
new The B-52's' album, "Good Stuff", which was issued in 1992;
it quickly ascended into the top 20 of The Billboard 200 Albums chart
while the title-track hit #1 on The Modern Rock list and "Tell It
Like It-I-Is" peaked at #13 on the same chart.
Two years later, the trio recorded the theme song for the soundtrack of
Steven Spielberg's "The Flintstones", the single "(Meet)
The Flintstones" was another American Top 40 hit for the band.
Cindy Wilson re-joined the band that released in 1998 the collection "Time
Capsule" which featured two previously unreleased songs, "Hallucinating
Pluto" and "Debbie", the latter of which scraped the bottom
of the Modern Rock Tracks top 40.
16 years between albums is a gap virtually unprecedented in modern music, however The B-52's with its 2008's "Funplex" continued to climb the U.S. Albums chart and the group found themselves firmly in the top 20. The first single off the CD, the title-track, quickly catapulted into the top 20 of the Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart.
