I like looking for things on tour.
I had really long hair, and we had this hairdresser, Laverne, that was in Athens. And she did my hair up really big. And she said, 'Honey, when you hang your head over the bed and make love, that hair is not going to move.'
I think more people feel like they're outside of the mainstream these days - there's more people who are doing their own thing, feeling that it's not bad to be a weirdo and respecting other people's differences. And all that kind of goes into the big ol' B-52 philosophy.
I love Atlanta. I feel really at home in Atlanta. We spent a lot of time there. But Athens is like home to me.
We've known Cyndi Lauper since she was in 'Blue Angel'; we did a TV show with her back in '79 or '80. We don't have any competition; we're complementary.
Sometimes we'd just play acoustic guitar and try out the parts and make a library. We'd use a double cassette player and make little edits.
I call it the LGBT Q and A community 'cause there's so many questions and answers.
We started in 1976, jamming, and we played our first show on Valentine's Day 1977, so we can mark 40 from there, or we can mark 40 from 1979 when we did our first record.
I've always wanted to do a solo record, and in 1999, I went over to Japan and did a project called NiNa, where I co-wrote with Yuki from Judy and Mary. It just sort of unleashed this realization in me that I could write.
I used to have a protest folk band in high school, and I wrote all my own songs. Then, in the B-52s, we would write collectively.
In the B-52s, each of us has our own wacky sensibility, which, when we come together, it's like the four-headed monster. And it's great because we have the same sense of humor.
With 'Love Shack,' once we put that chorus in, it did have more of a song structure. Even though the verses are all kind of different, the chorus was there along with 'The Love Shack' - I think that really made it a hit. Once we heard it in the studio, we played it for R.E.M., and they were like, 'Yes this is a hit.'
I think it really changes things when you're able to get married. I mean, the Marriage Equality Act was super important. I think you cannot believe it happened as fast as it did. For a lot of gay people, it's very surprising. You thought that this is going to be a struggle forever.
I hope our legacy will be enduring and that people think of us as an important band. But I think Ricky's guitar playing, our style of writing, the fact that we had men and women in the band and gay and straight, I think it's an important band, and the way we wrote by jamming, we really had a different approach.
I like harmonizing with other people, but a lot of times, I do harmonize with myself.
The Beatles had a huge impact on me. I did 'Strawberry Fields Forever', and we worked it out in an open tuning. That's such a beautiful song, and I think I did it in a different way.
I'm always saying in the studio, 'My vocals are too loud!' or 'My vocals have too much effect on them!' I like some of it, but I'm not a fan of loading effects onto my voice.
I would have loved to have been a broadcast journalist. I'd even love to be the weather girl. I have to watch the weather every night; I'm just obsessed.
'Deadbeat Club' means a lot to me.
We have a family dynamic - more like brothers and sisters than friends. So there can be a bit of competition, but there's also love and respect. But there's a thing to not push each other's buttons. You know what the buttons are, so don't push them.
