Consumer Guide Album

B-52's: The B-52's [Warner Bros., 1979]
Fond as I am of the pop junk they recycle--with love and panache, like the closet ecologists they are--there's something parochially suburban about turning it into the language of a world view. So I'm more delighted with their rhythms, which show off their Georgia roots by adapting the innovations of early funk (a decade late, just like the Stones and Chicago blues) to an endlessly danceable forcebeat format. Also delightful is their commitment to sexual integration--Cindy Wilson is singing more and more, although her voice occasionally gives out before her ambitions do. Major worry: only one of the copyright 1979 songs--my favorite track, "Dance This Mess Around"--is as amazing as the 1978 stuff. A