Search - B-52's :: Good Stuff

Underrated and Overshadowed

J. E. Doyle Jr. | Woodbridge, Virginia United States | 02/10/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Good Stuff" is a great album that has been overshadowed by "Cosmic Thing." On its own, it is a solid, well-crafted album that deserved both wider play and a wider audience. "Cosmic Thing" is an amazing album, and when "Good Stuff" was released three years later, people were expecting more of the same. What they got was the B-52's exploring more new territory. No worries, there is plenty of fun and plenty to love on this album, but it is definitely NOT a follow-up to "Cosmic Thing." "Good Stuff" stands on it's own and deserves more respect than it received upon it's initial release."

Great CD (even if not a great B52's CD)

Philip D. Mariconda | Seattle area, WA USA | 10/10/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The short staffed B52s took big chances here and won me over. However, most of their fans did not consider this Good Stuff.



This album is rather uncharacteristic with very little of their simpler, bouncy music (i.e. "Rock Lobster".) The rhythms are more subdued but still danceable. The music is much more expansive, but I still find myself singing along. I think they retained the party atmosphere for most of the album. I guess it's a party with wine and cheese instead of pizza and beer.



Track by track:

1. Tell It Like It T-I-is: Sets the tone nicely like I mentioned above.

2. Hot Pants Explosion: Naughty fun!

3. Good Stuff: The vocal play comes out for both Fred Scneider and Kate Pierson.

4. Revolution Earth: More etheral, more Kate; if you can get past the obvious overdubbing, it's really nice.

5. Dreamland: My favorite B-52s song - probably because I am a Yes fan; very unlike anything they've done before, but Kate and Fred take their vocals to a whole new level (for Kate, that's going above the stratosphere;) absolutely beautiful!

6. Is That You Mo-Dean: Back to simpler fun about an alien abduction.

7. The World's Green Laughter: An instrumental... sort of; Kate injects the "laughter" with the vocal play that she does so wonderfully - it makes rainforests sound romantic.

8. Vision of a Kiss: To quote History of the World Pt.1, "Nice, nice, not thrilling, but nice."

9. Breezin': Again, a smooth nice feel, but nothing spectacular.

10. Bad Influence: One of those occasional political songs they do; in this case, about people being outcast just for being different.



So if you're expecting a great B-52s album, you may be disappointed. But if you're open-minded that these are very talented musicians willing to step out of their comfort zone, you'll probably love this one."