The impact of the B-52s—who are bringing their Final Tour Ever of Planet Earth to The Venetian Theatre at The Venetian Resort Las Vegas, on October 19, 21, and 22—has been vast and far-reaching, to be sure, but there are a few things that really underscore just how influential they would be on other rock luminaries.  My favorite examples are how their breakout hit would go on to move a Beatle, and how their first televised performance of that song would have a lasting effect on two-thirds of Nirvana.

The song, “Rock Lobster” was unlike anything anyone had heard before.  Of course, as they love to tell people, the B-52s never set out to be a band.  As they told CBS News, earlier this year, that changed in the mid-‘70s.  Said Keith Strickland, “Sometimes I would be sitting around playing the guitar, and I would break a guitar string, and I wouldn’t change, you know, I would just retune it.”  Strickland went on to explain that the next day, his best friend, Ricky Wilson, began playing it—missing string and all—and laughingly told Strickland ‘I’ve just written the most stupid guitar riff you’ve ever heard!’”  That riff would become “Rock Lobster,” which became the band’s first song, and, in 1979, its first single.

On Friday, December 05, 1980, John Lennon would speak with Rolling Stone editor, Jonathan Cott for more than nine hours, about his upcoming album, Double Fantasy.  As we know now, Lennon would be murdered a mere three days later, and instead of his interview, Cott had to instead pen an obituary.  In one of the first passages of that interview—that was eventually run in its entirety, on the 30th anniversary of Lennon’s death, in the December 23, 2010 issue of Rolling Stone—Lennon explains how it was hearing “Rock Lobster” that got his creative juices flowing and inspired him to end his five-year exile from music and write and record the songs that became the triple-platinum Double Fantasy with Yoko Ono: "I was at a dance club one night in Bermuda,” John interrupted as he sat down on the couch, and Yoko got up to bring coffee. “Upstairs, they were playing disco, and downstairs I suddenly heard ‘Rock Lobster’ by the B-52s for the first time. Do you know it? It sounds just like Yoko’s music, so I said to meself, ‘It’s time to get out the old ax and wake the wife up!'” She and John spoke on the phone every day and sang each other the songs they had composed in between calls.

But wait: There’s more!  On January 26, 1980, The B-52s appeared as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live [Season 5, Episode 9].  Their performances of “Rock Lobster” and “Dance This Mess Around” comprised their first live television appearance and the sight of these weird, queer, new-wave punks, bouncing around the stage and flopping to the ground no doubt blew the minds of late-night viewers from coast to coast.  Two of these were an 11-year-old Dave Grohl in Springfield, Virginia, and a 13-year-old Kurt Cobain in Aberdeen, Washington, who would both later cite that performance as a revelation

Grohl, who rates the B-52s’ eponymous first album as the second most influential to him—between The Beatles’ The Beatles (aka the White Album) and Led Zeppelin’s Coda—has said that the B-52s’ appearance on SNL truly opened his mind to what music could be, telling the UK’s Far Out, on September 29, 2022: “I remember seeing the B-52s on Saturday Night Live.  It introduced me to the world of weird music. I was young, my parents were asleep. Songs like ’52 Girls’, ‘Rock Lobster’, of course…they definitely opened up a whole new world to me.”

As for me, the B-52s evoked two of my favorite responses: they made me laugh and they made me want to dance.  It wasn’t until I was in high school, and had begun DJing and collecting records, that I would take a deep dive into their music, and latch onto songs like “Private Idaho” and “Quiche Lorraine” (from 1980’s Wild Planet), “Mesopotamia” (from 1982’s Mesopotamia), and “Song for a Future Generation” (1983’s Whammy!).  It was also at this time that the late Ricky Wilson became one of my first rock n’ roll crushes (alongside Joe Strummer of The Clash), but that’s a story for another time.

So, if you want to catch The World’s Greatest Party Band one more time, before they spin off to Planet Claire, get your tickets, while you can! 

The B-52s: The Farewell Tour Ever of Planet Earth
The Venetian Theatre | The Venetian Resort Las Vegas
Click HERE for info

Get into it!
#TheB52s