SPACESHIPS! CRUSTACEA! BEEHIVES! New wave culture vultures The B-52's spun it all into floor-shaking hits, then survived tragedy to become even bigger. As singer KATE PIERSON releases a new solo album, she tells BILL DeMAIN of the band’s fierce commitment: “Even when we were singing about lobsters and volcanos, we sang like our lives depended on it!”

Portrait by LYNN GOLDSMITH.

NOVEMBER 1978, NEW YORK CITY, Tribeca. Inside the Mudd Club, The B-52’s are doing a soundcheck. They’re trying not to be distracted by Beat writer William Burroughs, who’s at the bar in a private eye trench coat and fedora, eyeballing them and scribbling notes. He’s flanked by two companions in matching outerwear.

The five-piece band from Athens, Georgia love Fellini movies, and here they are in what could be a scene from one.

They’d been asked to be part of a benefit, for Semiotext(e), a deconstructivist French magazine, and the night’s theme was outer space. “That’s probably why they picked us, because we had a few outer space songs,” says Kate Pierson, with a laugh.

She’s being modest. That summer, The B-52’s, with their elemental but ferocious dance grooves, thrift store chic and jittery, three-headed vocal attack, had become darlings of Manhattan’s downtown scene, earning props from cresting new wavers Blondie and Talking Heads. Their self-released 45, Rock Lobster, flew off the shelves at hip Greenwich Village record shop Bleecker Bob’s.

The Mudd Club show turned weirder, with “naked dancers pushing large objects around the stage… Very French,” says Pierson. Patti Smith did a few songs. Then, as Pierson and bandmate Cindy Wilson were getting ready backstage, Wilson screamed, “Oh my God, David Bowie’s here!” And in came Bowie, with Frank Zappa and William Burroughs. Three giants of pop’s avant-garde paying their respects felt like a benediction.

“A few songs into the set, some big guy in a lobster suit jumped up with us, started dancing and went right through the stage,” Pierson says. Keith Strickland’s drum kit almost slid into the hole after him. “We got through it, with Keith balanced somehow. That was one of the most unusual gigs we ever did, but it was part of our moment in New York.”

IN CAPE COD, WHERE THE LOBSTERS ARE PLENTIFUL, Pierson is talking to MOJO in the beach house she shares with her wife, designer Monica Coleman. It’s a bright August morning and the 76-year-old’s vivid hues match it – long candy-red hair, lime-green blouse and specs that frame cornflower blue eyes.

Lynn Goldsmith/Getty (2)

Beyond the hive mind: Kate Pierson in 1979; (below) The B-52’s dance their mess around, 1979 (from left) Pierson, Keith Strickland, Fred Schneider, Ricky Wilson, Cindy Wilson.

Welcome to the bomb party: The B-52’s wow a hometown crowd at the Classic Theatre, Athens, GA, May 20, 1978 (from left) Cindy, Kate, Fred, Keith and Ricky; (above) a Flaming Volcano, the cocktail that ignited the band.

Tom Hill/WireImage/Getty, KG/Alamy

She’s promoting her second solo album, Radios & Rainbows. Featuring collaborations with contemporary tunesmith-producers including Sia, Bleu and Chris Braide, it casts Pierson’s still-supple belt in everything from noir melodrama (Evil Love) to Chic-style disco (Wings), with “personal and vulnerable” lyrics that touch on dysfunctional relationships, spiritual rebirth and modern politics. Does she feel a difference between her solo work and The B-52’s?