Hi I'm Fred Schneider the B-52's and I'm
going to play the big hit off of our
First album well one of the many but
actually it is Rock Lobster so wish me
Luck queuing it up and I'll be blabbing
boy I'm a  professional so we
Record this in night 1979 and the
original idea for it i went to this
Disco in Atlanta Georgia called 2001 and
instead of having a light show and
Fabulousness if they had a slideshow and
it was empty and they showed pictures of
Puppies, babies and lobsters on a grill
and I thought ok rock lobster that's a
Good title for a song because it's the
B-52s we were just jamming at the time
And so we jammed on it for hours and
hours and miles and miles of
Reel-to-reel tape and Keith and Ricky
when and spliced ideas together brought
Him to Kate  Cindy and I we put in
our sixth sense and we came up with this
Six minutes 48 second song which we
have a hard time editing ourselves but
Who cares
So this is actually a seersucker suit
but they couldn't do that on the album
And I was hot flow in America it says
play loud because when I first heard it
Was like this a little rinky-dink
because I didn't never really realize
What it sounded like but it went it was
doing well what's going off the charts
No we did saturday night live
And after that it just went back up the
charts went platinum double-platinum we
Toured the world and Cindy does the
fish we'll hear them later the fish noises
That's definitely analogic patio go no
arm but we always just did things our
Own ways you don't have any preconceived
notions I mean up i was writing lyrics
With Keith on the way into the studio to
jam and but then I changed you know my
My lines and stuff and then the girls
headed there noises at the end it was
Took three this album took three weeks
to record for I think 35 thousand
Dollars and I wish we had just papers
health instead of owning everything the
Warner Brothers but I'm and they didn't
want to do with us but once we started
Selling they got on board are we play
Toronto we did the the heat wave
Festival and we got to need all the
different acts that were playing there
Was real exciting went to Australia
where we were sort of like playing small
Clubs in
All over the place in America Canada and
then we go to Australia and Rock Lobster
Was like the biggest thing until We Are
the World and we were like in shock as
They treated us like we were super
stars like in slubby outfits and you
Know doing just our same little
rinky-dink sad and it's not drinking but
It wasn't like like show and we did try
smoke but but back then that was the bad
Smoke it was  wax based but we
were singing on in America somewhere on
Our early tours and the smoke started
going up from the floor and up and up
And pretty soon it's over our heads and
all you're here to see a smoke and
Hearing us laughing because if something
goes wrong we just laugh it's not like
Your fired
So we worked that well bikini Wales you
see them at the beach course uh like I
Said it only it didn't take that like we
did this what we did it we did it live
In the studio and then did some overdubs
but it's pretty much alive recording at
Compass Point studios in the Bahamas and
Chris Blackwell was the producer he
Crosse and Blackwell marmalade and all
that stuff he was great and Robert Ash
Also co-produced well he produced it and
Chris oversaw the whole project I'm going um a lot
There's the Yoko Ono part
she came on our 25th anniversary to a
Show in New York YoKo came onstage and
did her
Yoko thing on Rock Lobster which was
like a big totally exciting
She's really great and actually her and
John we didn't know this at the time but we
Found out of reading rolling stone that
John heard Rock Lobster at a club in the
In Bermuda and when he heard you like
the song thought it  was really great then he
Heard the Yoko part
That's when he said to Yoko we got to get back in the studio there
Ready for you and us and they did Double
Fantasy and we've been in touch with
Yoko ever since we're big fans of hers
too and there's the fish noise which we
Still do but if this has been this song
actually was one of the best-selling
Independent singles in 1978 back with 52
girls are we never saw a penny but it
Put us on the map especially Australia
that's that's what got us to be so big
In Canada to Australia so and the band is
still performing so hopefully we'll be
In Toronto again soon all over Canada so
let's see what else
And friend came up with the original
logo and has the asterisks which is
Grammatically incorrect so we've
corrected that now it's just B
5 2's and that was rock lobster I was
trying to come up with titles for songs
And love Shack just popped in my mind I
didn't know whether that other bands had
Done so it's called Love Shack so it was
all original to me they had a a picture
Of somebody a girl and a guy running
away from the flying saucer
So we tried to grab it off them to use
as an album but we're gonna this is
Gonna be our cover and that eventually
inspired the the spacey lyrics of Iran
