Cosmic Thing soared to the top of the Billboard Album chart, sold five million copies and yielded their first-ever Hot 10 hits — "Love Shack" and "Roam" and a Top 40 hit with "Deadbeat Club.
They played to sold-out audience worldwide on a tour that would last more than 18 months, including an Earth Day gig before nearly , people in New York City's Central Park. Soon after, Cindy Wilson amicably departed. Before long, Wilson had successfully completed her first solo project — a baby girl.
Meanwhile, Kate collaborated with other artists, including Athens compatriots R. Reuniting permanently with Cindy, the Bs wrote and recorded two new tracks that fit perfectly into Time Capsule , a stellar collection of hits. With the release of the two-disc collection Nude on the Moon: the Bs Anthology , the Bs took much-deserved credit for a body of work that is unique, beloved and timeless in its own way. The Bs influence cuts a wide path through much of so-called 'modern rock' — from the low-fi efforts of nouveau garage bands to the retro-hip of ultra-lounge, to the very core of dance music itself.
It is indeed all these things and much more. In the Bs released their first new album in 16 years, the aptly titled Funplex. For their initial show on Valentine's Day , Ricky and Keith played along with pre-recorded rhythm and keyboard tracks, while Cindy , Kate , and Fred traded off on vocals. In time, the members became a capable live act, with Ricky playing guitar he usually removed the two middle strings to give his instrument a rougher sound , Kate on vocals and keyboards usually playing a keyboard bass with her left hand and a Farfisa organ with her right , Cindy on vocals and percussion, Fred on vocals, and Keith on drums.
The band adopted the name the Bs from local slang for high-rise beehive hairdos, and they developed a devoted fan following in Athens. As the Bs ' popularity spread, Danny Beard , who helped run a record store in Atlanta, offered to help them make a record for his fledgling label DB Records.
As the Bs became aware of the burgeoning punk and new wave scene in New York City, they began booking shows in the Big Apple with the single as their calling card, and their unique sound and kitschy style soon made them favorites at CBGB and Max's Kansas City. With their off-kilter but dance-friendly approach, the Bs sounded friendly and accessible in a way many new wave acts didn't, and they were soon being scouted by major labels.
Blackwell soon flew the Bs to Compass Point Studios in the Bahamas, where he produced the sessions for their self-titled debut album. Released in July , The Bs received strong reviews and the re-recorded version of "Rock Lobster" became a minor hit, rising to 56 on the Top Singles charts. The album also enjoyed a sales boost after the group made an appearance on Saturday Night Live.
The Bs would eventually go platinum, and John Lennon cited the album as a personal favorite in interviews. Tighter and more polished but no less idiosyncratic than the debut, the album came out in September and proved to be as successful as the debut, spawning another minor hit, "Private Idaho," and peaking at 18 on the album charts.
David Byrne of Talking Heads , long a supporter of the band, was brought in to produce the sessions, but creative differences between Byrne and the group, as well as a lack of enthusiasm from their record labels, led them to scrap the project, and some of the completed tracks were issued in early as an EP, Mesopotamia. The Bs changed up their recording approach for their next album, 's Whammy! With a greater reliance on synthesizers and drum machines, Ricky and Keith performed all the instruments on the backing tracks, while Fred , Kate , and Cindy only provided vocals.
When the band reconvened to work on their next album, Ricky Wilson 's health began to fail him, and on October 12, , he died of AIDS-related illnesses, though initially the band claimed he died of natural causes. The Bs eventually completed the album Bouncing Off the Satellites , which was released in September , but the surviving group members were too shaken with grief to tour or promote the album, and they went on hiatus.
In , the surviving members of the Bs began writing new material and returned to the recording studio, with Nile Rodgers producing one set of sessions and Don Was producing another. Reinvigorated, the group launched a successful concert tour in support, with Keith taking over on guitar and several guest musicians joining them on the road to handle additional bass, drum, and keyboard duties.
The Same Mistakes. In an earlier post , we noted the dilemma many New Wave groups faced as the days of skinny ties and twitchy pop began to give way to the grey overcoats and angular, funk -inspired dance music of Post Punk. Like Lene Lovich, the B's had epitomized the retro dayglo orange fun of the late seventies scene.
On songs such as "Rock Lobster" and "Planet Claire" they had mixed twangy guitar lines, kooky organs and beehive hairdos into a sweet and frothy confection, filling college dorm dance floors and even making inroads onto mainstream radio. But as the eighties dawned, they too went looking for ways to expand their musical range, and assert their willingness to take artistic risks without abandoning their abiding commitment to the groove that moves.
To help them make the transition from New Wave to Post Punk, from the college dorm to the local art gallery, they enlisted the help of David Byrne, hoping he might do for the five-piece from Athens, Georgia what Brian Eno had done for The Talking Heads, secure their place as critical darlings while paving the way for further commercial success. By the time that Byrne came to work with the band in , he had fully absorbed Eno's interest in African polyrythms and analogue synthesizers, and was already beginning work on his first solo effort, a score for Twyla Tharp's dance company that he would call, The Catherine Wheel.
He soon stripped the B's' sound down to a dancey, primitive beat, the kitschy Secret Agent Man style guitar lines losing out to sleek synthesized bass lines, brass arrangements, and inventive percussion effects of the kind that were beginning to emerge from the nascent hip hop scene in New York.
The resulting sound was considerably darker and more atonal than the band's earlier efforts, full of angular, abstract grooves that stood in stark contrast to the increasingly earthy and distinctly southern sensuality of Kate Pierson's and Cindy Wilson's vocals.
It was adventurous, challenging music, but perhaps more reflective of Byrne's private preoccupations of the time than the interests of the band or its record company. At some point, the band and its producer fell out with one another and the sessions were abandoned. To recoup some of the costs, six of the most fully developed tracks were released as an ep, called Mesopotamia , a name which captured the sense of a band reaching deep into the past for the sound of the future.
Mesopotamia has always had its defenders. I certainly remember liking it a great deal more than their first two albums at the time of its release, but in general it has been regarded as a misstep by the band's fans.
When it came for a cd reissue, it was completely remixed so as to efface any sign of Bryne's involvement, and it is this sanitized version which is today most readily available. But back in , by some fortuitous accident, initial copies of the ep were released on the Island Record label in the UK and parts of Europe that included Byrne's longer, dubbier, and altogether more interesting mixes of several tracks, offering a brief glimpse of what The B's' third album might well have sounded like had Bryne been allowed to complete the project.
The version of Mesopotamia presented here is ripped from an early release UK copy on Island Records, complete with the black inner sleeve. The first side includes the extended mix of "Loveland," while the b-side offers versions of "Cake" and "Throw That Beat In The Garbage Can" that are far superior to those released subsequently.
Thanks to VanceMan for the tracks from side two! Anonymous 13 September, VanceMan 16 September, Anonymous 17 September, Lorenzo 06 October, Unknown 07 November, Crash The Driver 07 November, Anonymous 12 January, Anonymous 10 March, Anonymous 16 May, Bernard 23 May, Anonymous 23 May, Jamie Pierce 07 August, Unknown 19 September, Anonymous 23 September, Allison 07 October, Anonymous 03 November, Anonymous 25 February, Anonymous 22 April, Anonymous 09 July, Ghostchild 20 September, Thombeau 27 September, Bill Bowman 19 February,
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