I've Just Remembered Why I Liked The 1980's So Much.

In a word, the "B-52's".  What can I say, I love this band.  How can you not?   Skin tight mini-dresses, thigh high go-go boots, bee-hive hairdo's, plastic neon colored jewelry, hair colors that can only be described as raspberry, suicide blond and not found in nature and mascara for days.  And those were just the guys in the group.  The girls were a WHOLE lot more flashy!!!  They were thrift store chic right out of the gate.

Their music was fun as hell and their sound was amazingly unique, a strange blend of New Wave, 1960's surfer style and cowbell.  Yes, cowbell.  And damned good cowbell to be truthful.  I can only assume that mastering the cowbell is right up there with learning how to play the saw and still managing to keep all of your fingers...

I can remember the first time that I heard the B-52's.  It was 1978 in San Francisco.  I was sitting in a dumpy little gay bar called Toad Hall and "Rock Lobster" started blaring over the juke box.  That bar came to LIFE in about half a nano-second.  Holy shit, that song just rocks.  Tonight on the radio they played a version of it I have never heard before, a 15 minute long extended dance mix.  I was in heaven!!!  Sea Squirt caught me in the kitchen just rocking out and doing the "robot".  It was not pretty but as I like to say, sometimes you just gotta dance like nobody's watching.

Throughout the 80's and 90's the B-52's kept me smiling, laughing, dancing in elevators and singing at the top of my lungs in the car with the windows rolled all of the way up.  I was known to freak the shit out of people when I was stopped at the lights.  Hey, when songs like "Dry County",  "Love Shack",  "Bouncing Off The Satellite's",  "Private Idaho",  "Dance That Mess Around" and "Deadbeat Club" came on the stereo I just had to cut loose.  I still do.

Today the group is still together, recording and touring and all of them approaching legal retirement age.  But still up there on stage.  Go-go boots and cowbells.  Mini skirts and mile-high hairdos.  Hip replacements and hearing aids.  Lord, I certainly understand that one!!!   They've been around for so long that they are now being "discovered" by a whole new generation.  One young enough to be their grandchildren.   Think about it...  How cool must it be to tell your friends that your grandma or grandpa is in the B-52's???  Yep, that's my grandpa Fred up there with the cowbell and the Foster-Grants.  I LOVE IT!!!

I raise my shot glass to Keith, Cindy, Kate and Fred.   Guys, keep on shakin' that shack cause it still sounds damned good from here!!!