♫ Before I talk, I should read a POLL! ♪ ILM Artist Poll #93 ♪ B-52’s ♫

WHO'S TO BLAME!?

i love the whole idea behind 'Party Out of Bounds', as well as the execution. when you play it out of nowhere, it really does sound like the B-52's are crashing your party and making it a million times more fun (which makes it a great opener, too)

"ok, who ordered pizza?"

and this is my "too low!" of the countdown, too. i expected it to be top 3 for sure

oh, ALSO: cindy ripping into a machine-gun bongo pattern
<3

xp I heard the formative drink was one of these

https://s3-media3.fl.yelpcdn.com/bphoto/tMw2KftMIbgsgujVcpUwIw/348s.jpg

this one has basically been stuck in my head since Bee OK picked it for the voting-thread title. their nerviest, jumpy-footed-est rock song. love the back and forth between fred and kate - "crashers getting bombed!" "who's to blame?"

another great update of an old concept. about half of fred's lyrics seem like they could come straight from some now-public-domain educational film about throwing a fun and wholesome party, but his delivery, cindy's bongos, and the keith-and-ricky attack turn up the dial and something much more dangerous and exciting seems to be sneaking in the back door. something is going out of bounds and it's great. "people get sick - they play the wrong games" is one of fred's very best lyrics imho. then stuff like "It shouldn't be difficult! Try not to condemn!" seems like it came in from a straight ahead sloganeering punk record. what a creation.

xp

oh shit, that's right! flaming volcano!

a good night at a tiki bar involves a flaming volcano, then a zombie, then maybe a test pilot to top things off. THEN you go crash someone's party and order pizza imo

BE TACTFUL
WHEN MAKING THE ROUNDS

The B-52's are the only ones qualified to give party advice in song form.

This has got to be Planet Claire or Dance This Mess Around #1. I hope it's the latter.

On ILX, :Roam" might be #1.

* "Roam"

there are about five songs left on my ballot where i'd be 100% unsurprised, and satisfied, if they made #1.

they have a lot of legit contenders for #1, both in the ILX and non-ILX context.

I tried to make the email address Party Out of Bounds but was already taken on gmail.

Astonished this wasn't Top 3

They have nine songs that are better?

"Roam" as #1 = disgusting things you'd never anticipate

"roam" rules

https://i.imgur.com/W9Bjq3t.jpg
9. Deadbeat Club

501 points, 21 votes. 2 first place votes.

Cosmic Thing
music video (with michael stipe cameo)

live 1990

Well this is a surprise

TOO LOW

many famous faces of Chronic Town in that video

I get kind of emotional thinking about them coming back to make that album.

i was one of the #1 voters. there are other b-52's songs that rock much harder or that make me giggle but this one puts tears in my eyes, i think it's so beautiful. one of the best musical evocations of real bittersweetness, genuine smiles in looking back through incredible loss and pain, to a time that can never be had again but which still lifts the spirit and matters. a love letter of gratitude to one's bandmates, a statement of just how much it could matter, at the right time, to have a few other proud deadbeats to bum around with.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/94/f0/16/94f0167c72e74c32cfbd3db7e83f103b.jpg

i went on a date once to allen's. i don't remember what the beer cost in 2003 but the burgers were solid greasy-spoon fare at a reasonable price.

downstairs was foxz, a dirty, leaking, falling-apart bar whose customers were roughly split between queers and tolerant bud-drinking southern drunks, and on karaoke wednesdays, a whole supplemental contingent of college and townie hipsters. the first time i went as a freshman i was too chicken and shy to join my friends doing "love shack." the last time i went before they closed and relocated, i remedied that.

https://i.imgur.com/8b1zrMK.jpg
8. Mesopotamia 

618 points, 25 votes. 2 first place votes.

Mesopotamia
live 1990, with an extended shadow puppet dance party in the middle starring Kate and Fred

cool show from 1982

live 1983

this is lame to point out, but each of those images, top down from left to right, specifically references lyrics from the song

My one and only visit to Athens in the early 90s I made a pilgrimage to Allen's.

AND YES THOSE ARE THE REAL CUNEIFORM SYMBOLS FOR 1, 2, AND 3

Dr Casino otm, great writeup, Deadbeat was my #2 but it could have been #1

also cosign this 100%:

The B-52's are the only ones qualified to give party advice in song form.

― jmm

https://i.imgur.com/ck8VWma.jpg
7. Planet Claire

735 points, 30 votes. Highest position on ballot: 2

The B-52’s
live 1982

miming to the album track for a kid’s show in 1987

First one in the Top 10 without a number 1 vote

I also have no idea of the order, so this rollout is a surprise to me as well.

That was my #2. So many things I love: the Peter Gunn riff (and Ricky's riffing overall,) Kate's wordless vocalizations, Cindy's congas, Fred's "BUT SHE ISN'T!!!" I never get tired of this song. Just heard it a few weeks ago while seeing a local band, as intermission music. I danced to the intermission music.

Too low!

as a first track on a debut album, this is as definitive a statement of purpose as "Black Sabbath"

^^^ yes!

I saw The Charlatans last month and between the opening band and them they broke out this song. They also played an obscure Pink Floyd track. I think the DJ was better than the band.

I love how Fred's vocal doesn't start for about 2:30 of a 4:34 track

I always thought it was "WELL, SHE ISN'T"? works either way!

whoa there, let's talk about mesopotamia a little first.

I pitched a paper for this year's MoPop Pop Conference based on "Deadbeat Club."

Re "Planet Claire": we don't discuss Kate Pierson's organ here and elsewhere enough.

https://i.imgur.com/VsGj8YB.jpg
6. Give Me Back My Man

757 points, 29 votes. 2 first place votes.

Wild Planet
Music Video (this is sick footage imo - the kind of stuff that temporarily makes it your favorite song)

xpost it's just what you hear when all the other sounds on Earth are turned down low enough

Planet Claire is definitely one of their best songs

Xpost

Nearly made Planet Clare my number 1, but had it at 2 and Mesopotamia at 1. PC was first B-52s song I ever heard. It was about 1980, I was about 12, and a 16 year old friend of the family took me out in his mom's big white Oldsmobile one night. He played Planet Claire over and over, ducking his head kinda like David Byrne, and making the motorized drivers seat rise up and down to the measures of the music. He pulled over to a farmer's field, 'cause he wanted to pilfer some corn, but the cobs were all too small. Both things freaked me out! But by the third or fourth play, I started digging it.

high five to the other #1 voter for Give Me Back My Man

I always thought it was "WELL, SHE ISN'T"?

It is, busy day at work and typing too fast.